I?ve never been a fur coat kind of woman. Stoles and long mink coats never really appealed to me, and I never understood the attraction.
Some years ago when I was a newspaper recruiter, I joined a friend on a visit to Neiman Marcus during a break at a journalists’ convention. We ended up in the fur department, with me following her because I?d never go there on my own. She tried on several coats, and I watched and admired the look of elegance that emanated from the coats as she posed in the mirror. She coaxed me into trying on a full-length mink.
I looked in the mirror, and I looked gorgeous! The coat cost about $15,000, but it made me feel like a million. I finally saw the transformative power of mink. That was the first and last time I had on fur. I loved the coat, but the idea of mink didn’t really sit well with me. Instead, I got a very similar faux fur coat. I would encourage others to do the same if the idea of fur doesn’t bode well with you either. Fashion brands like Lily Lulu Fashion offer a variety of faux coats. I?m still not a mink-coat woman, but I understood the fuss.
This week at auction, I was surprised to see a large array of mink and faux coats, stoles, jackets, hats and pelt collars for sale. Some had labels (Gwenn Pennington Paris, Miss Dior) and some did not. Some also had tears at the inside seams.
Hats and pelt collars were spread out over four tables, while coats, stoles, and jackets were hung tightly on one rack. The auction also included evening gowns and other vintage clothing. The clothes were from the 1960s, said a regular to this auction house who is a buyer of vintage clothing. The female owner apparently had not worn them since then and had stored them in her closet, she said.
Awed by so much fur, I asked her: “Do women still wear these?” She didn?t quite answer my question, but she did buy a lot of fur once the auction got started. As we examined the lot, I mentioned that singer Janet Jackson was being trashed for wearing a mink coat in an ad (for the label Blackglama).
The animal rights group PETA has said that Jackson had sworn off mink, so the organization was disappointed to see her wearing it. For years in the black community, mink coats have been a status symbol. And I?m not sure if black women ? or men – stopped wearing their coats during the days when PETA members were throwing red paint on celebrities who wore fur.
On its website, the organization listed what it called the worst-dressed celebrities who still wear fur. Included was Aretha Franklin, with PETA cattily saying this about her: “Finally: footage proving that Bigfoot really does exist!” Insulting one of our icons is not a good way to endear itself to the black community.
At the auction, the vintage clothes buyer bought a ton of stuff. She went toe to toe with another buyer, a big towering man who really didn?t know what he was doing (when a dress came up for bids, he asked what the garment was. A flapper dress, he was told. His reply: What?s that?).
He learned quickly, though, repeatedly picking the brains of the buyer and another bidder, checking out the name brands they were bidding on and bidding against them. The buyer was livid and quite readily showed her ire. He told someone later that he wasn’t buying for himself but for a friend who had a shop.
The prices for the garments were ridiculously low. I had spotted a nice full-length coat (at right) that certainly would bring in more than $100. It sold for $30. A stole with a lovely satin lining (in the photo below, left) that I figured would sell well went for $15.
Many of the pieces sold for as little as $5 each, and these weren?t just hats selling for that price. The most expensive item ? from what I could see and hear – was a full-length fur coat that sold for $100.
The auctioneer raved about a black fur with mink-colored cuffs, so much so that an auction staffer helping her ? admitting that he knew nothing about furs but the coat looked expensive (it did) ? joined in the bidding. He got the coat for a whopping $75.
After bidders had chosen the furs they wanted, about eight short coats were left on the rack. The auctioneer was ready to get rid of all of them for a starting bid of $25. There were no takers.
If fur is your thing, this was the place to be. Though, I still think it?s a waste of money.
