Is Faux Fur the Summer’s Most Unexpected Trend?

Faux fur’s natural environment exists within those frigid, wintry days when one needs a bit more warmth than a regular old trench coat can provide. For whatever reason, though, the animal-friendly piece of outerwear has extended its reign into the blistering summertime. Just yesterday, Sam Smith turned his verdant English garden into a runway of sorts, teasing a new single coming later this month by strutting in a collared, classic looking light faux fur coat; now, fellow musician Kali Uchis is taking on the unlikely summertime textile in her own way.

If you keep up with Uchis’s Instagram, then you’ll know that she’s fully enjoying Cancer season. The young singer-songwriter took in the aquamarine waters of Miami in a colorful Betty Boop crop top and turquoise leopard print bottoms just last week, but yesterday she went in a very different sartorial direction: bundling up in a similarly colored, dramatic faux fur coat, which she cinched at the waist with a silver belt to match her platform shoes. Uchis is just the latest artist to don a fuzzy jacket over the past few days—Rosalía and Jorja Smith each wore fuzzy Saks Potts pieces to their respective festival dates—but the question still remains: Why exactly everyone is reaching for such unseasonal pieces in the midst of summer?

Maybe they’re all feeling bored of warm-weather fashion, or maybe faux fur is actually much more versatile than it looks. Whatever the reason, we can’t blame Uchis for bringing that blue coat out for a summertime test run—it looks too good to leave for languishing in the back of her closet until the temperatures drop yet again.