This Aviation Lifestyle
Flight Attendant Uniforms… an interesting study
When I’m not flying around somewhere, another place I can be found is working within the retail environment. My favorite things to produce for retailers are wardrobe workshops. From teacher associations to realtor offices to law firms and such, it’s always so rewarding to put on a program about workplace professionalism for various audiences.
Aside from business etiquette and establishing office parameters, there is of course always the question regarding dress. Some years ago when Casual Fridays morphed on into Business Casual, question after question ensued as to what was appropriate to wear within the workplace. No matter how much our current culture tries to deny it, how people physically present themselves through clothing does indeed create an important impression on others. It’s true that first impressions count. It is also true that subsequent impressions count as well especially so to one’s boss, co-workers, clients and within the community in general.
As impressions count in the working world then so far, in my mind at least, aviation uniforms still make a great impression. Similar to the medical profession, one can look at an individual in an aviation uniform and generally be able to recognize what part of aviation the person is involved with professionally. There are a myriad of uniforms as there are jobs within this industry of course. However, since my childhood days of flying around in commercial jets, I’ve been intrigued by what flight attendants are wearing and how that changes from time to time and from airline to airline.
During the 1970’s into the early 80’s I noticed how completely matched-up the flight attendants seemed to be. How utterly neat they looked walking with pilots through airport terminals. A perfectly turned-out sorority of sorts complete with the ubiquitous scarf tied jauntily at the neck.
By the mid 1980’s I began to notice how much accessorizing was going on in regards to adding bold gold jewelry to the uniforms. It seemed that nine times out of ten, I’d espy a flight attendant with either bright gold button earrings on or a large gold chain bracelet dangling from their wrist. Yellow gold was the metal of choice back then and definitely added a shimmery touch to their uniforms.
Then as the 1990’s rolled around, it looked like bold yellow gold jewelry pieces in general were giving way to delicate white gold, platinum and silver jewelry. Essentially this was a scaling down of the 80’s style factor along with the scaling down of shoulder-pads and bigger hair-do’s as well. Overall, all things style-wise felt like they were getting much more subdued. In a way this was refreshing but by the time the year 2000 showed up, such a styling had become frankly a bit boring.
Boring has now given-way to an expression of artistically inspired whimsy to some degree. Air France’s uniforms feature a very cute wide red tie sash cinching the waistline of its collared shirtwaist dresses. Continental has a variety of floppy bow ties, pins and pocket ‘kerchiefs going on within their uniforms. Southwest has a vintage-motif styled tie alongside a surprising shorts selection offering. Lufthansa’s hats and scarf-designs are quite mod n’ hip while Quantas’ Aboriginal art inspired prints are definitely unique.
In my humble opinion, the most successful flight attendant uniforms merge a tailored professionalism that borders traditional business suiting with a dash of artistically rendered cultural elements.
In this regard, I’d give Quantas, Air France and the neat hat within United Airline’s collection top prizes. As well, I’d strongly recommend having a bit more “interest” added into the very plain uniforms that Aer Lingus, British Airways and Virgin Atlantic have out at the moment. Finally, SAS Scandinavian Airline’s uniforms perhaps need to be completely reworked as the clothing and ball cap hats look more scouting-uniforms than something an airline professional would expect to be wearing.
Some airlines have turned to well known fashion designers for style assistance but with mixed results. KLM’s Nina Ricci uniforms are tepid at best. Ralph Lauren, Bill Blass, Kate Spade, Richard Tyler and others have all collaborated in the pursuit of rendering great looking flight attendant uniforms. Currently Air New Zealand is getting a lot of flack regarding their proposed uniforms designed by Trelise Cooper for 2011, which feature bold pink and black patterning. After seeing a photo of one of the dresses, I have to agree with a lot of the public sentiment being expressed that it’s more of a party dress than a professional outfit. This leads me to wonder what Karl Lagerfeld would propose from the house of Chanel? Tweed coat tops and camellia details might be neat to see translated into an airline uniform. After all, it was Coco Chanel herself who ushered the concept of uniform dressing into the parlance of the modern woman’s wardrobe.
An utterly fascinating visual history of airline flight attendant uniforms from years past on into the present can be found on www.uniformfreak.com. This web site is focused around quite an extensive collection which one man has put together showcasing uniforms running the gamut from literally A to Z: Adria Airways to Zoom Airlines UK. The collector is employed with KLM Royal Dutch Airlines and had dreamed about being a flight attendant since he was a young boy. It was fun for me to scroll through this site and see how uniforms have changed throughout time and cultural styling. American Airlines experienced a subtle transitioning from decade to decade while Delta had a whole lot of changing going on with their colors and prints during the 1960’s and 70’s.
Uniforms tend to have a stigma of being plain and boring but within the airline industry, it’s actually quite an interesting study of change and cultures.
by Lachlan Ivy