US high fashion goes to the dogs

[DoozyDog]

By Marylin Johnson, Atlanta
January 31, 2006

YOU may not see any poodle skirts this season, but almost anything else goes in the world of canine couture.

As China celebrates the Year of the Dog, Americans are dressing their best friends in everything chic. And it's more than off-label sweaters from pet stores.

In fact, 2006 is a very good year for pooches in the United States, since fashionable dog owners go for top labels: Burberry, Coach, Carolina Herrera, Donald J. Pliner, Gucci, Louis Vuitton, Ralph Lauren and Tiffany & Co.

Five-year-old Scout, a King Charles spaniel, boasts a wardrobe of chic clothing, including a Burberry raincoat and a faux fur coat, said her owner DeDe Childress, 47, who is single.

"Scout is my child," said the saleswoman at the Travis and Company interior design showroom in the Atlanta Decorative Arts Centre.

"I look at her outfits as being utilitarian, but it's a little excessive, I know. All the women who come into the showroom are dressed in designer clothes, so why not the pets? Scout, who comes to work every day with me, has to be a part of this as well."

While Scout owns a Burberry raincoat, her owner does not. "I dress my 'child' better than I do myself," said Ms Childress tongue-in-cheek.

High fashions are part of about $US36 billion ($A47 billion) that owners spent on their pets last year, and the numbers keep rising, according to the American Pet Products Manufacturers Association.

In many dog-friendly homes, owners don't blink an eye at doggie fashions that cost the same price as human styles. Try a Gucci carrier with the signature double G pattern for $US720 or a $US225 Louis Vuitton monogram collar. If those don't work, there's a Juicy Couture parka for $US45 or $US68 for a signature logo collar with charms from Coach.

"Luxury fashion is hot because baby boomers, who are empty nesters and no longer paying tuition for their kids, have lots of disposable income," said Bob Vetere of the Pet Products Manufacturers Association.

In addition to perfumes, shoes and handbags, luxury fashion houses find that doggie gear also brings in the dough.

Gucci constantly adds new leashes, collars and jumpers to its line, plus rubber dog bones in traditional red, green or black for $US50 to $US65.

Interior designer Kim Zimmerman, owner of Ansley, a Jack Russell terrier, said her penchant to make her pooch presentable started out as a utilitarian thing — keeping Ansley warm or dry.

"Now, it's evolved into style," she said.

COX

More powder to the people …
A NEW ZEALAND woman plans to send 6000 packs of dehydrated dog food powder to starving children in Kenya.

Christine Drummond, founder of Mighty Mix dog food, told reporters in Christchurch that her mix, called NZ's Raw Dry Nourish, would be shipped in March to Rusinga Island, on Kenya's Lake Victoria. She said it was made of a mixture of freeze-dried beef, mutton, pork, chicken, deer velvet, green lip mussels, kelp, garlic, eggs, whole grain cereals and flax-seed flour — the same ingredients that go into her company's dog biscuits.

Ms Drummond said she was working with Kenya's Mercy Mission charity, which would add water to the powder to create a "nutritional supplement" that dogs thrive on. Gaynor Siviter, an agent for Mighty Mix, said: "It beats eating rice."

http://www.theage.com.au/news/world/...590441198.html