A leather-free car interior: what the materials are

Leather-free isn’t the same as vegan

In 2021 Volvo announced that all its new electric cars would be leather-free, starting with the C40 Recharge. In the same announcement it pointed out that dropping leather is a step, but doesn’t by itself make an interior vegan. It also kept offering wool-blend options.

Mercedes-Benz went further with the vegan package for its electric GLC. It was certified by The Vegan Society, which assessed around a hundred components from different suppliers: seats, steering wheel, door trims, console, headliner and carpet. Wherever an animal-derived component turned up, it was replaced. That is the distinction to bear in mind: you can see the cover, but not the adhesives, the thread or the finishes.

Synthetic leather

This is the closest thing to leather. Mercedes calls its version ARTICO and describes it as a leather replica; it covers the seats and steering wheel in the vegan interior. Range Rover uses Ultrafabrics, a polyurethane material from a Japanese maker.

In the sun it has one advantage. A study published by SAE, the international society of automotive engineers, compared how interior materials age in sunlight, and synthetic leather resisted ultraviolet radiation better than leather and textiles.

The name matters too. According to COTANCE, the confederation of European tanners, the European standard EN 15987 reserves the word “leather” for material whose original fibre structure is intact. COTANCE also counts Spain among the countries with their own rules on the term.

Microfibre

It feels like suede and goes where a hand needs grip. Alcantara is the most familiar, but plenty of makers have their own. Porsche uses its own, Race-Tex, in the leather-free Taycan interiors.

Cloth

This is the furthest from leather, and where “leather-free” stretches furthest. In those same Taycan interiors, the microfibre is paired with a wool-content cloth in the houndstooth that Porsche calls Pepita. Range Rover launched its leather-free interior pairing Ultrafabrics with a wool blend from Kvadrat, the Danish textile house. Neither has leather in it; both have wool.

Volvo introduced Nordico, a cloth made with recycled material, such as plastic bottles and wine corks, and with bio-attributed material from forests in Sweden and Finland.

Retrimming a car that came without leather

Each maker has its own material and its own name for it, and what the car’s specification calls ARTICO, Race-Tex or Pepita can’t be swapped for “something similar” without it showing. It pays to identify the original by its trade name and ask for a sample before deciding.

And if the aim is a vegan interior, the cover isn’t enough. As the Mercedes case shows, you also need to ask about the thread, the adhesive, the foam and the carpet.

What to ask before deciding

With these answered, you know what you are asking for:

The aim

Leather-free or vegan? They are not the same.

The material

Synthetic leather, microfibre or cloth? What is it called, and who makes it?

Wool

Does the cloth contain wool or any other animal fibre?

What you can’t see

Are the thread, adhesive, foam and carpet free of animal products too?

The original

Does it match what the car left the factory with?