Fall is the time for fur, as everyone knows, and fur means mink. Or does it?
This fall the fur is flying as usual, but now the animals are coming from every corner of Noah's ark in colors, forms and designs that would make the old sable set roll over and play possum.
In fact, furriers are using everything short of their own hides — Russian fitch, French rabbit, Algerian sand rat, Polish pony, Australian kangaroo and Wyoming buffalo. And they are handling the animal skins like fabric, tailoring them into haute couture shapes, cutting them into culottes, evening gowns and leggings. Taking even greater lib erties, the furriers are dyeing skins col ors nature never dreamed of, and in patterns taken right off the walls of an Op-Pop gallery. The fun furs are for secretaries who want the feel of fur without the financial pinch of mink and for two-mink socialites who are looking for new skins to crawl into.
Kulcu's Hip-Huggers. At the cheap end of the spectrum is Manhattan's Kuku shop, which opened last month especially to ride herd on the new four-footed fad. For $390, Kuku will part with a harebrained outfit consisting of rabbit hip-huggers in black-and-white checks, topped with a rabbit halter and black-and-white striped jacket. For slightly more, a girl can pick up a striking Indian-kid coat that is shaped like a sailor's pea jacket, or an imitation-cheetah walking suit made of calfskin.
At the other end of the spectrum is Manhattan's Georges Kaplan, whose co-owner and designer, Jacques Kap lan, has long been one of society's favorite purveyors of both conventional and novel furs. For mothers and daughters, he offers matching Mondrian-dyed rabbit dressed with red, green and white rectangles — $395 for her and $295 for her daughter.
For more formal wear, he has a backless calfskin evening dress stenciled to look like giraffe, a floor-length, tent-shaped Mongolian lamb coat that, with peaked hood attached, exposes only the eyes, and a white broadtail wedding dress with a ten-foot train. His showstopper is a black broadtail coat that is full of holes. It brings the peekaboo look to furs, can be worn over a full-length evening dress or nothing more than a body stocking—as shown in Kaplan's shows.
Zany Zebra. Kuku and Kaplan are not alone. Bergdorf Goodman has a zany "zebra" dress made from Italian lamb and Russian broadtail. The black broadtail stripes are individually cut and hand-sewn into the white lamb, all for $2,700. Pour l'après ski, Revillon has whipped up a horizontally stitched chinchilla jacket with matching chinchilla boots.