The designers really want us to wear fur. Or something like that.

There was really no way around that. A show celebrating 100 years of Fendi always meant celebrating fur.

After all, the brand began as a handbag and fur workshop. And according to Sylvia Venturi Fendi, the designer behind the Centenary Collection and the only family involved in the business (now owned by LVMH Moët Ennessy Louis Vuitton), she came up with memories of the first Fendi when she began to think about what it would look like. In 1966, at age 6, she happened to walk her first Fendi show, wearing a child-sized furry equestrian jacket designed by Karl Lagerfeld. She had a photo on the mood board behind the scenes.

So it's no surprise that Venturini's six-year-old twin grandson was wearing a new version of that jacket, and that it first opened to find it to be a lovely Fendi show, with something that looked like a sensual fox fur (or because it was really furry, so most of the fur was really). Or more fur followed in the graceful beaded flocks of the 1920s and powerful shoulder suits that fell stylistically between the 40s and 80s, including Interlucia fur. Not to mention the best new accessories of the week: the Great Coat collar and the long fur Gillette Cam scarf on the front are cut to wear on its own.

But to see what looked like fur, or at least fur, on almost every other runway in Milan? That was unexpected. Especially what really was noteworthy for the fur was probably furry. Almost yeti free. Ivanat Trump Farley in the 1980s. Mob wife fur. I'm covered in all the fur fur.

This made it impossible to avoid the conclusion that, as far as designers are concerned, this particular material has long been unfavourable and is once again part of Fashion Arsenal.

But is it fur?

It's easy to see this as yet another example of the general repulsion of awakening. Animal police refused pent-up. But even more subtle and confused, something is happening.

“It's not fur, it's shearing,” said Matteo Tamburini, Todd's creative director, before the show, with long Louche outerwear neatly packed with silhouettes and a big skunk-like fur. Sorry, but shearing.

Undoubtedly, shearling is actually a newly cut lamb skin with wool on the left, and is actually a kind of fur, and PETA considers it to be “animal origin”, but its meaning doesn't seem to be much controversial as it could be a by-product.

Either way, Ferragamo's Maximilian Davis said much the same after sending out a cool, dance-inspired collection that included not only a large fur coat but also fur shrugs and fur flip-flops.

“It's all shirring,” he said. “Fur is something that cannot be used today. It should not be used today, but all suppliers have developed techniques and various details that can mimic real fur.” ​​And that was what he wanted to show off. That in itself is a luxury.

And there was a variety in Prada that looked more shirring-mink. Dolce & Gabbana shearing (big white chub). Long hair shearing at Emporio Armani for men and women. Etro had a free-splitting deluxe wool fur and a large faux fur trapper hat that cleaned the huge floors. Roberto Cavalli's faux fur (leopard/fox mix), and even a Ferrari faux fur skirt. Needless to say, the faux fur, used as a kind of mental illness trim in Barry, has become an unexpected highlight of the Milan show under designer Simone Belotti.

Go under the skin

Bottle green, pink and black, pretending to be a hairy barry, Pelt surrounded by a black leather skirt with high slits. I highlighted the tailcoat cut of a gray flannel tunic and played Peekaboos in matching pairs of gray flannel shorts. Or fill in the bottom of the top of the neat peplum. They were part of what was the trademark oddity of an otherwise untouched collection, and what made Mr. Berotti's work so compelling. He is a genius who proposes a twist beneath the button-up surface. (And he made the best black dress of the week: an organza flock that glides like a cloud from one shoulder).

Why did he get attracted to fur – “It's wild,” Berotti said after the show. He suggested a routine break, including going to the corner for five seconds from the study group and screaming.

This is about all of this fur. It plays a different role in the minds of manufacturers. And potentially the eyes of the viewer. Or the spirit of the person who wears it.

For example, Ferrari's creative director Rocco Iannone said he was attracted to fake fur because of the way he conveyed the “volume,” a Vroom feeling that leads to the brand. Todd's Tamburini said he first began to see fur on the streets and followed their leads.

Davis of Ferragamo said: When you think about Ferragamo's DNA, it's all about the charm of Hollywood and the 1950s movie stars, and they all had fur around their shoulders. “He wanted, he said, “to take those references and make them modern.”

And at Fendi, Benchlini Fendi said her shirring (and two herringbone pieces of actual mink) “nodded at what Fendi is and is still the case.” Like a hobo rib knee hat with a cloud of black nets representing her grandmother's hairnet. “I have a lot of respect for the fact that when something is beautiful, it's always beautiful,” she said.

If this all sounds like justification, it might be. If the designer wants to have a cake (sensitive to animal rights movements) and sounds like he wants to eat it (subject to its actual fur), then that may be the case too. Whatever you want to call these “fur,” whatever is actually made, is exactly what most people see: fur. And it exploits some Atavistic instincts buried deep inside our lizard brains. It may be harder to eliminate than anyone would have thought.