Since 18th century people tried to grow blue foxes. But only in the end of 19th age the first farmed silver fox skins were sold by London Auction House at the crazy price of 2781 USD.
In the 20th of last century farms appeared in England, Italy, Switzerland, Greece, Norway, Finland and even in Japan. The prices went down and it became possible to make fox jackets and coats. The global economic crises of 1929-1933 years dramatically cut demand for luxurious goods and left glam and chic of foxes only for Hollywood divas as they knew that contrast between marble face and soft fur could make “femme fatale” look even stronger. In 1937 first platinum foxes were sold at Oslo Auction for 300USD per skin in spite normal price for silver fox was about 40 USD. It was sensation for fur market. Fantastic success of Norwegian platinum fox pushed farmers to put attention to colored mink. In 1966 there appeared new leader in fur industry as 90% of silver foxes and up to 60% of blue foxes were farmed in Soviet Union.
As process of selection went its own way in every country, for the moment there are 4 main types of farmed silver foxes : Russian, American, Norwegian and Finnish . The best are, of course, last two types – longest hair, big skins. Norwegian type is excellent for any kind of trimmings and Finnish is ideal for fashion luxurious garments because of extremely long hair.
Both Finland and Norway are leaders in mutations ( colored foxes and blue foxes).
The classification below is based on grading system of Finnish Fur Sales( Auction House in Helsinki), where abovementioned foxes are sold on exclusive base. “SAGA ROYAL” is label for the best skins of foxes and blue foxes.
Silver fox is the most typical kind of foxes. It has 3-colored hair : from dark-grey through white to black. It’s called “silver” because of presence of white color and has the longest hair. Designers always use it for dying. The latest trend is “bleaching” of silver foxes – then it comes into variety of brown and beige shadows.
The most expensive type is Golden fox. You can meet very unusual light colored skins with kind of pale rose shadow when part of the hair is white.
Gold Cross fox is called so because of dark cross on the skin. Golden Island fox has pale yellow color has variation called Shadow Golden Island fox when white “collar” and sides appear. Very rare is White fox mutation – having snow white color, it could come to light creamy shadow.
Platinum and Arctic Marble types exist both as foxes and blue foxes mutations. Platinum type has white hairs with grey tops and Artic Marble has black or white hairs.
Burgundy fox is very similar to Silver fox, but instead of black color you can see vine-brown.
Fox with cinnamon colored hairs and yellow underwool is called Seychelles fox. Fawn Light fox has yellow-rose basic color with light-brown backbone. Sun Glo fox is white with light reddish backbone and chaotic spots. New mutations appear permanently : Arctic Golden Island, Sapphire Gold, Smokey, Red Stone, Fire Gold, State Glow, Pearl, Amber, etc.
Sometimes there are very few skins of rare mutation ( not exceeding 20 pieces) – then it becomes a real fight for them among Fashion Houses as this is excellent possibility to show something unique and be protected from being copied.
Now it’s difficult to imagine that only couple of years ago very few designers used foxes for their collections. The real breakthrough was made by Celine when they showed light caramel blue fox coats in 2003-2004 collection. Last season almost every designer used foxes and blue foxes : John Galliano used green colored blue fox for giant collars, Jean Paul Gaultier showed lilac coat with dark-red bleached silver fox trimming. Lanvin created coat, decorated with feathered fox, Missoni used mix of Silver, Cross and Golden Island foxes for motley striped jacket, both Fendi and Roberto Cavalli used Golden foxes for sexy and seductive designs.
So, this season foxes are designers’ favorites. As natural colors are mostly demanded – there is a lot of space for mutations. SAGA FURS Design Centre develops new technologies, making limitless creative possibilities to become real and it’s evident that fox is back to fashion forever.