Doctor Who Costume: The Vogue Verdict

Doctor Who Costume: The Vogue Verdict

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Jodie Whittaker

When Jodie Whittaker was announced as the first female Doctor Who in July, she said her appointment felt “overwhelming, as a feminist”. So what does a feminist Time Lord look like? The BBC has just unveiled the first official image of the 13th Doctor’s new costume – and clearly, the costume department did not take heed of Vogue’s instruction back in October that Louis Vuitton’s spring/summer 2018 collection would be a salient style reference for the moodboard. To our despair, there’s nary a tech trainer nor a fabulous jacquard frock coat in sight.

Instead, the new Doctor Who costume comprises a clever hotch-potch of sartorial nods to previous Doctors. A grey ankle-skimming coat has a hint of a dressing gown about it thanks to piping on the sleeves and hem, and its length recalls David Tennant’s hulking brown Withnail-style greatcoat as the Tenth Doctor. Teal culottes and yellow braces reference both Patrick Troughton (the Second Doctor) and Matt Smith’s bowtie-and-braces-wearing Oxbridge academic steampunk-cum-Eleventh Doctor.

The brown work boots and socks reference Smith again, plus Christopher Eccleston (the Ninth Doctor), and Colin Baker (the technicolour-coated Number Six). As for the rainbow-stripes on the navy sweater? Alas, it’s not evidence of a timely investment in Gucci knitwear; rather, a score for Tom Baker, the Fourth Doctor, whose 12-foot-long stripy scarf kept thousands of knitting grandmothers busy when the BBC released a knitting pattern to inspire nation-wide cast-offs in the Eighties.

We acknowledge that the BBC license fee might not stretch to an 18th-Century-style, hand-embroidered brocade frock coat, designed by Vuitton’s Nicolas Ghesquière in order to explore the incorporation of “anachronism” and “pieces considered as costume” into an everyday wardrobe. We’ll admit that an LV pair of cropped black leather trousers is perhaps a touch clichéd – a Tomb Raider approach to time-travelling.

But braces? Yellow braces? Two straps of elastic reaching from waist to shoulders, as everyone in possession of a pair of breasts or a searingly sharp memory of Jodie Marsh’s public appearances knows, are incompatible with the female body. Then there’s the coat, which could do with being a bit more oversized and ideally rendered in thick woollen check, if its to be considered cognisant of autumn/winter 2017’s trends. Neither a cosmic hobo nor a jolly dandy nor a deliberately tasteless try-hard (see Matt Smith’s fez, Christopher Eccleston’s leather jacket), Whittaker’s Doctor costume establishes her as resolutely Time-Lord-next-door and is set to endear her to fans thanks to those subtle leans on the programme’s history.

As far as we can see, however, the only advice she’s taken from the pages of Vogue pertains to the earrings which snake from ear lobe to cartilage.

Let’s hope Whittaker whacks on some Saint Laurent rhinestones for the Christmas special

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