31 Days of Bond Fashion
DAY 15: THE FISHTAIL PARKA as seen in Skyfall (2015).
Consider being a costume designer facing this direction in a script: “'A slender young man in his twenties, dressed in an elegant suit, moves in next to Bond.” That was the situation Jany Temime found herself in when she came to re-creating one of the franchise’s most beloved characters. Ben Whishaw’s Q was a bold departure from the Q of old, and yet the costume direction for his opening scene in the National Gallery with Bond gave no hint as to his character. It would be up to Jany Temime to figure that out because for Ben Whishaw, costuming was a vital part of his process: “I love how wearing someone else’s clothes can make you feel different, move differently, even think differently. I’m always clear in my head that the character I’m playing is very distinct from me and at the same time so much of you ends up leaking into the character.”
“In that first moment they are together, I had very little time to establish a character,” Temime explained. “It's not like meeting someone and having a drink…I wanted Bond to think he's just a nerd or a student.” She chose a coffee-coloured fishtail parka for the job, with the detachable fur-lined hood removed. Fishtail parkas were originally designed for the US Army in the 1950s. The split and cords in the back made it so that a soldier could tie the sides of the coat around their legs to keep out the weather. It soon became popular with Mods in the UK. Q’s was sourced from Pretty Green, Liam Gallagher’s brand inspired by subcultures “from Mods to ravers.” In short, it positioned Q as a hipster. In 2011, the jacket would have set you back £255. Intentional or not, the brand history proved a nice bit of foreshadowing to Q’s homemade modular synth in No Time To Die – a man who’s built his own electronic music equipment has probably seen a rave or two.
Underneath the coat was a pricy moleskin Margiela jacket, a Reiss shirt, plum-coloured Hentsch Man checked trousers and a snazzy purple tie to match. “They were modish, nerdy, expensive clothes that nobody else would recognise,” said Temime, “except for another computer wizard like Q.” All in all, it was a wardrobe built to emphasise his youth and cockiness, and to position him as part of the new world as opposed to Bond’s old one. Still, for as different as they were, Bond and Q at least shared expensive taste in menswear. Maybe that was step one in them coming to understand each other.
Sources: GQ, Bond Suits, Bond on Set: Filming Skyfall, The Independent, Pretty Green.
