A Shaggy Dog Story:
Canine Lovers S hafe
Their Pets’ Coats
\/Voven Pooch-Hair Products
Are Fetching Big Bucks;
9 Shampoo, and Then Wear ...
By BILL RICHARDS
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... C1059 and ... Gavan-Gor
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Christmas list: dog-hair clothes.
Ms. Close, of course, acts out the wishes
of the wicked Cruella ... in the big
holiday-season remake of Walt Disney
Co.'s “101 Dalmatians." In the movie, Ms.
Close’s Cruella lusts for a coat made out of
dog fur-hide and all.
Ms. Gavan«Gord0n. a Minneapolis-area
school teacher, is willing to settle for just
the hair. She is having a sweater knitted
out of the fur of her late Samoyed, Nikki.
“It's going to have long sleeves, a high
collar and a ruffle below the waist. I’m so
excited, I can hardly wait."
Bomber Jackets, $1,000
Perhaps Ms. DeViI has been going
about her quest all wrong. lt seems there is
more than enough dog hair to go around
without resorting to Skinning puppies. Ac-
cording to the Pet information Bureau in
Washington. ... there are cmently 54.2
million dogs in the U.S. and their numbers
are growing. With dog hair piling up at a
record rate, ... clothing is coming
into its own as a fashion statement.
“People are either intrigued or really
repelled by the idea," says Nancy Papp, a
Sama Fe, N~ weaver who sells dozens of
dog-hair coats annually. A big item from
Ms. Papp‘s collection this year: dog-hair
bomber jackers at $1.000 and up.
Ms. Papp. who is dogless herself ...
a responsibility I don’t need„") buys her
raw material from groomers who charge
as much as 510 a pound for dog hair. A
bomber jacket requires twzrtcrthree
pounds, she says, bemoanìng her overhead
costs: “You’d think there’d be a surplus of
Indeed, most dogs leave several
sweaters worth of hair behind during the
dog, along with
enough of its hair
for whatever garment they desire.
“I like to get to know my subjects,”
says the ... weaver, whose studio
is heaped with bags ‘of hair sent in by
customexs from coast to coast. Heather
Mead, one of Ms. Smith’s local clients, has
had two sweaters woven from the fur of her
12-year-old male Pekìngese, Shaolung, and
is gathering hair for a third. Ms. Mead
describes her sweaters thus: “The closest
thing I can think of is cashmere, but
...
... clothiers first spin the mate»
rial into yam, then weave on a loom or knit
with needles or a machìne.Working at her
loom, Ms. Smith sports her own fuzzy
sweater, which was once worn au naturel
by a Newfoundland named Barney. Her
dogvhair sweaters go for S350 and up; she
sold $4,000 worth last year. Ms. Smith also
weaves with cat and chinchilla hair. One
Customer from Maine recently sent a bag
of fur she collected from her two wolves,
which she races.
Carolyn Smith
tions as an English teacher and truck
driver to go into ... weaving ...
years ago. These days she has so much
work she is thinking of hiring an appren-
tice weaver. “This has gone from a little-
old-lady occupation to an art form," she
says.
There is no dog»haìr-apparel trade as»
socìation, but professional weavers say
business is up. When she first started
weaving dog hair 16 years ago, Detta
Juusola of Maple Plain, Minn., says, “I
had to look for people to buy it.” Now,
“they come to me,” and she has a two-year
backlog.
For those who can't wait, there is
“Knitting With Dog Hair," a book that
came out two years ago. Robert Weil, its
editor, was ridiculed during the four years
he spent persuading St. Martin's Press, a
unit of Holtzbrinck Publishing Group of
Germany, to publish it.
“The book stores thought it was a joke,
and the sales reps kept saying it was going
lo be the dog of this year’s list ... ha, ha.
ha," says Mr. Weil, who also edits Mario
Cuomo and Studs Turkei. “My integrity as
an editor was ... Unjustly so:
The book has sold 20.000 copies.
Not all dog hair is created equal. The
best is thick and soft, usually the shorter,
denser stuff from the undercoat, deep
down in the fur.
Rottweilers and puodles shed hair that
is ideal for spinning, says Kendall Crolìus,
the author of “Knitting With Dog Hair."
Her book praises Samoyeds as “the Queen
of Canine Spinnables“ but dismisses Rho-
desian Rìdgebacks and Staffordshire Bull
Terriers as unfit for the loom. As for
Dalmatian hair: “Totally unsuitable for
spinning," Ms. Crolius says.
All dog hair does, however, have one
thing in common: It can cause allergic
reactions in fur-sensitive people - upto 3%
of the population, says Dr. Thomas Platts-
Mills, head of the Asthma and Allergic
Disease Center al the University of Vir-
ginia Medical School. To reduce the chance
of an allergic reaction, Dr. Plants-Mills
recommends scrubbing canine hair with a
strong dog shampoo before wearing.
Doting dog-owners have been putting
on the dog for years. In her book, Ms.
... notes that Vincent Astor, the 19th
century New York City millionaire, often
wore a scarf his wife Minnie knitted from
the hair of their poodle, Nora. "Mikhail
Baryshnikov has a pair of dog-hair leg
warmers," Ms. Crolius says. “Probably
Russian Wolfhound.”
Mr. Baryshnikov’s New York agent,
Edgar Vincent, says he doesn’t know any-
thing about the leg warmers, but adds that
the dancer once gave a friend a scarf made
out of his dog’s hair.
Others save their dog‘s hair the way
they do their baby’s first locks. Annie May
Marshall, a wèaver in Pasadena, Calif.,
says a customer sent her 16 pounds of fur
she had culled over the years from a ...
named Bodey; the hair came back as a
vest. “This is not sume off-the~walI thing,”
she says. “It's a tender momento."
Some people, however, recoil at the
very idea of making anything out of dog
hair. Shirley Kay, a Salem. Ore., horse
breeder, bought a collie-hair vest several
years ago to match her own red hair and
dons il for dinner parties and other occa-
sioog. “People say ‘How could you kill a
... just to make a vest'?’ ... says Ms. Kay,
whomust explain that it came from comb-
ings, not hide. That satisfies most people,
but dogs remain curious, sniffing her more
vigorously than usual.
The confusion may be traceable to ...
Dalmatians” and Ms. Close’s dognappmg
character. Ms. Close’s spçlfeswoman s_ays
the actress is too busy pushing her movie-
and assuring fans that she actually lqves
anìmals - to ... dog-hair
clothing. But, the spokeswoman ¿adds un-
... “I don’t think she has anything like
that."