Polestar 2’s All-Vegan Interiors Nabs PETA U.K. Award

Volvo’s First Fully Electric Mass-Production Vehicle Will Feature Innovative ‘Weave Tech’ Material

For Immediate Release:
March 7, 2019

Contact:
Moira Colley 202-483-6372

A Compassionate Business Award is on its way from PETA U.K. to Volvo-affiliated Polestar, whose highly anticipated Polestar 2—its first fully electric mass-production vehicle, which will be on display at the Geneva International Motor Show this week—will include sumptuous all-vegan interiors as a standard feature.

In the Polestar 2 launch presentation, Polestar CEO Thomas Ingenlath told attendees that he’d spare them the “disturbing video of mass production of leather” and explained the company’s decision: “Our care for the environment goes beyond the electric drive chain. With the Polestar 2, we designed our interior offer to promote and accelerate the shift of the car industry towards leather-free interiors.” These interiors include Weave Tech, a water- and dirt-repellent material inspired by scuba diving sportswear.

“The leather industry is as toxic to the Earth as it is cruel to cows,” says PETA U.K. Director of Corporate Projects Yvonne Taylor. “The Polestar 2’s innovative interiors will appeal to all compassionate, eco-minded consumers, and PETA looks forward to a day when animal-free fabrics are the go-to materials for all car manufacturers.”

A PETA video exposé revealed that calves are branded on the face and that gentle cows and bulls are electroshocked and beaten before finally being slaughtered to be made into the leather interiors offered by the world’s largest car companies. It takes an average of three cows’ hides to cover the interior of one standard car. Turning animal skins into leather requires the use of 130 different chemicals—including cyanide—and leather production produces massive amounts of the carbon emissions that contribute to climate change.

Polestar joins several other luxury carmakers—including Tesla, Ferrari, and Mercedes-Benz—in offering plush, high-performing vegan leather interiors.

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to abuse in any way”—opposes speciesism, which is a supremacist worldview. For more information, please visit PETA.org.