It is always nice, during a recession, to wake up and read that someone has spent $44,813 on Captain Kirk’s uniform. Somehow it makes all the estimates and forecasts about insufferable loans and unpayable deficits seem just that little bit less worrying. I mean, hell, if there are still people willing to pay the equivalent of a housing deposit on some faux-naval space pyjamas then perhaps the Age of Austerity has been postponed after all.
William Shatner’s outfit from The Wrath of Khan is, of course, much more than just part of cinematic history. It is evidence that there really is life beyond our poor, circumscribed understanding of the space/time continuum. Robert Fletcher, the designer behind this red, black and white two piece, seems to have slipped through some sort of sartorial worm hole in order to beam back images of fashion from the future. Observe the gathering at the bottom of the trousers, the ankle cuffs, the harem-like shape, the side-fastening jacket, the ‘cinched-in’ waist belt and the embellishment on the sleeves; from collar to cuff this outfit has included the co-ordinates of almost every current fashion trend. This is more than just a military-inspired sci-fi costume; this is a uniform communication from the future.
Of course, predicting in the early 1980s what our workwear would look like in the distant future is a tricky business. With his epaulette-embellished jacket and Aladdin-fit trousers Captain Kirk was nigh on perfect; Back to the Future has us in inside out jeans and shrink-to-fit clothing by now; Mad Max II just went all guns blazing for all-over leather.
So, nearly $45,000 later, Shatner’s uniform premonitions are proved correct. As the tagline (nearly) says; “At the end of the universe lies the beginning of vengeance. And harem trousers.”
First published, Director-e, July 2010
Nell Frizzell
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