AbstractReal‐time simulation of fur is a key element in many virtual reality applications. However, it is still difficult to simulate effects of fur animation in real‐time. In this paper, we propose an interactive fur simulation method, to calculate effects of external forces, such as wind and gravity, and direct manipulation for real‐time interactive animation. The proposed method consists of two layered textures for rendering. The first texture represents volumes of fur, and the second texture covers and laps the edge of the first texture. Our approach unifies these two structures using a shared vertex array to enhance rendering performance. We modify the shared vertex array with external force simulations and render it into the graphics pipeline. The proposed method is applied to virtual fashion design and 3D story telling as an example. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.