When Catherine Sulenta started working as a flight attendant for Air New Zealand in 1984, the staff attire was vastly different from what it is today. Her first uniform had a red, white and blue colour scheme to echo the Union Jack, and comprised houndstooth-printed dresses and pinafores, a baker-boy style hat and compulsory high black pumps. “We got weighed every morning – your weight wasn’t allowed to fluctuate,” recalls Sulenta. “And we had to retire at 55.”
In her nearly 40 years working for the airline, she cycled through five different uniforms, ranging from shoulder-padded blazers to minimalist trouser suits in austere greys and teal. Some, though by New Zealand designers, weren’t particularly reflective of its culture. Then again, cultural signifiers in airline uniforms can often play to crass stereotypes. Emirates’ uniforms, which were introduced in 2008, are beige to reflect the UAE’s deserts, while the signature veiled hat nods to local religious customs, but come across as minxish. Singapore Airlines’ flight attendants, who have worn the same Pierre Balmain-designed sarong kebaya uniform since 1974, are said to embody “Asian values and hospitality”.
Airline uniforms are reflective not only of changing fashion tastes but of social progress, charged with establishing the visual identities of their home nations. New Zealand-born, London-based designer Emilia Wickstead had a lot riding on the debut of her new uniforms for Air New Zealand, the first redesign in 15 years. Wickstead drew from the airline’s archive, which included designs of the ’60s by Christian Dior and the ’70s by Nina Ricci, while incorporating touchpoints that speak to New Zealand’s cultural identity. “It was important for me to tell a story about our heritage and the history of Aotearoa,” says the designer, who has previously made uniforms for the waitresses at Marylebone’s Chiltern Firehouse but is better known for dressing a well-heeled clientele.
Wickstead enlisted Māori artist and tā moko (tattoo) practitioner Te Rangitu Netana to hand-draw all of the uniform’s prints, while adhering to the airline’s palette of black, white and purple. One georgette draws on nga purapura whetu, the constellations of stars and people that shape New Zealand, while another is printed with native kōwhai flowers, which represent a change of season, and kakano (seeds), which symbolise beginnings, growth and knowledge. “The dispersing of those seeds by our manu (birds) traversing the skies serves as a metaphor for our crew members and the role they play in representing our country,” says Te Rangitu. Pilots are in pinstriped suits, while flight attendants and ground staff can choose from a range of suits and separates (including a Polynesian lavalava or wrap skirt for the islands) and a pillbox hat and bag. All staff can wear flat or heeled shoes.
The consideration of comfort is far removed from the “golden age” of air travel, in the ’50s and ’60s, where airlines parroted the “sex sells seats” mantra. “At the time it was mainly male passengers flying, so the stewards were courtesans or geishas of the air,” says Valerie Steele, director and chief curator of The Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology. “Instead of being a kind of nurse or waitress [as in the 1930s], they had a very sexualised look.”
The attendants of the now-defunct Pan Am, for example, represented cookie-cutter femininity: young, slim, conventionally attractive women with perfectly coiffed hair and flattering uniforms. Southwest Airlines of Texas, meanwhile, put their attendants in hot pants and go-go boots. In 1964, flight attendants were one of the first groups to file a case against biased hiring practices under the United States’ Civil Rights Act. “The stewardesses were protesting against the fact that they had to resign by the time they were 32, weight requirements and that they had to wear clothes that might be uncomfortable or revealing,” says Steele.
Still, for many airlines, comfort has remained an afterthought. Up until 2023, Qantas had a policy that required all female attendants to wear heels, while Japan Airlines only scrapped its mandatory skirt and heels policy in 2020. In 2023, a group of American Airlines flight attendants were awarded more than $1mn in a lawsuit arguing that their uniforms, which were treated with formaldehyde to prevent wrinkling, had caused a raft of health issues.
Sulenta says her favourite uniforms to wear were those that allowed for “stretching, kneeling, bending down, sitting and sleeping”, as well as for the expanding waistlines that come as a result of the pressurised cabin. “It’s true that you get off a bit rounder than when you got on.” She adds: “It’s especially important now with ultra-long haul flights – you could be in that uniform for 20 hours.”
Uniform designs today are also a reflection of how the experience of flying has changed from being a luxury experience to becoming, as Ryanair’s group chief executive Michael O’Leary put it: a trip on “a bloody bus with wings”. With the rise of low-cost air travel, flying “ceased to be exclusive and became more of a primitive struggle for existence,” says Steele. She notes that uniforms today are now designed to manage disgruntled or potentially aggressive passengers.
The public are still peculiarly invested in airline uniforms, however; see the negative reaction to Ozwald Boateng’s designs for British Airways, in 2023. “He’s a tailor – couldn’t he at least give the [staff] a nice jacket?” says Steele. “I think the company didn’t want to pay for a nice jacket.” She adds: “The uniforms become a stand-in for people’s hostility towards the whole airline industry.”
Fashion researcher Doris de Pont notes that one of the biggest changes affecting airline uniform design today is the staff itself: “The workforce looks completely different from what it did in the ’60s, in terms of size and age and a much greater variety of gender presentations.” Virgin Atlantic led the charge in 2022 with the introduction of its gender-neutral policy, which allowed attendants to choose which version of the cherry-red Vivienne Westwood-designed uniform they wanted to wear. Many airlines have followed.
And while most airlines have done away with weight restrictions for their staff, some remain: in 2023, Hainan Airlines came under scrutiny for a new “health” policy that mandated staff weight meet a “standard limit”.
Wickstead’s uniforms cater to a size range that goes from six to 30, and have options for gender-nonconforming attendants. “I wanted to create a sense of belonging for the 6,000 people that are going to wear this uniform,” says the designer. “We are designing for inclusivity – all ages, all sizes, all backgrounds.”
“Airline uniforms aren’t just reflecting who we are in a sort of a tourist brochure,” adds de Pont, “but also the diversity of the country, geography and society.” To that end, the airline uniform has become a significant cultural artefact in its own right; a representation of the customs and values of its home country, hurtling through the air at 30,000 feet.
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