When you become a vegan, there are several things that nobody tells you, which in my opinion are quite important when you are a person who is into fashion. It is the fact that you don’t wear any leather anymore, because you aim to become a cruelty-free consumer. And this is quite difficult as the majority of bags and shoes are made from real leather. After researching a little more about this topic, I have discovered some environmental issues which are related to leather. First of all leather has been the skin of an animal, and I don’t know about you but I think it is quite disgusting to wear someone’s skin. Secondly, the animals are not the only ones who are suffering from the high demand of leather. The modern day tanning process which is used to prevent the leather from decomposing uses extremely toxic chemicals, many of which are known carcinogens. Formaldehyde, cyanide, lead, and chromium are all used in different tanneries around the world, and these dangerous toxins are released into waterways during the manufacturing process. Many people working within this environment tend to get serious illness. Also, the extreme amounts of chemicals used in order to create the desired finish, make it impossible for the leather to biodegrade. If you are not a vegan, some alternatives to this are second hand leather, or buying from companies that recycle existing leather and other companies that are using less chemical tanning processes, that is great, however there are just a few of them. But it you are vegan, it is extremely hard to find fashionable vegan shoes and bags. Stella McCartney is one of the first premium brands that does not use any leather or fur in their collections. Which is great, but also a little sad that there is only one brand that does vegan in a fashionable way. Luckily I have recently discovered a very cool vegan accessories brand Matt&Nat from Canada. They don’t use any animal based materials in their products and the bags look very fashionable too. The brand has been experimenting with different recycled materials such as recycled nylons, cardboard, rubber and cork. Since 2007 they started using linings only made out of 100% recycled plastic bottles. In the picture above I have made a selection of several of my faves, have a look on their webshop for the vegan bag heaven.
