Songsamai Rajthevee made the Thai team’s uniform for the opening ceremony.
‘That is the type of design we need,” Thailand’s shooting athlete Tanyaporn Prucksakorn says of Team USA’s opening ceremony look.
Anyone would agree: the US are the uncrowned best-dressed at this year’s Parade of Nations at the Rio Olympics opening ceremony. The stylish ensemble was smart but not stuffy. An eye-catching, striped tee worn underneath the blazer offered a pop of fun. And the whole team looked undeniably American in their patriotically-coloured boat shoes. Give it up to Polo Ralph Lauren, the brand behind this sartorial win.
There may be no concrete dress code for the opening ceremony, as we can decipher from the sea of tracksuits, saris, seersucker blazers and rainforest-patterned dresses that packed the Maracanã Stadium on Aug 5 (and again at the closing on Aug 21). But with a runway that draws more audience than all the fashion weeks of the world combined, it is unavoidable that the parade turns its athletes into something of a fashion statement and cultural showboat.
Team USA’s closing ceremony outfit comes in three colours athletes can choose from.
Scoring any points in the national image department requires a uniform that is stylish, smart and makes instantaneously clear which nationality the wearer is from. This means going beyond the nondescript minimum of a mere suit and slacks or tracksuit. At the very least, do it for the athlete’s confidence — it’s a simple fact that nice clothes can work like an armour to make you feel good from looking good.
Most notably in the west, big fashion names, both high end and high street, shower their support to dress their country’s national teams, be it Polo Ralph Lauren for USA, Emporio Armani for Italy, Lacoste for France or H&M for Sweden.
In poverty-ridden nations like Cuba, designers and clothing brands are actually unwilling to be known as the official outfitters of the national team, for fear of local protests, but in others, being known as the fashion brand who dresses the national team is PR gold. So much politics and potential surrounds this one single outfit that it is fair to say that they can be seen as a reflection of a country’s taste, with fashion value that is worthy of speculation just as much as the actual sports competitions.
In Thailand, Grand Sport is the sponsor for the training and competition clothes, but a budget is allocated by the National Olympic Committee of Thailand (NOCT) to pay for the athlete’s formal uniforms. Songsamai Rajthevee, a respected tailor house, is employed to make the formal attire Thailand’s national team wore at the opening ceremony — although in Thai, they are referred to as “travelling outfits”.
“Athletes sometimes wear this too at the airport when they are on their journey to the host destination,” says Songsamai Rajthevee’s managing director Kollavat Kongruangkij. “It is also the outfit that is worn when they go and bid farewell to royalty or the prime minister before going off to competitions.”
This explains the stifling formality that has limited the Thailand’s uniforms to a look of jackets and slacks for the most part, with some years altering for more casualness — but never anything too fashion-forward or outside of the box.
For the past 30 years, this branch of the Songsamai empire has been dressing Thailand’s athletes, not only for the Olympics, but also for the Sea Games and Asian Games. As members of the NOCT were customers of their spotless suits themselves, they have continuously returned to Songsamai year after year to tailor the national team’s uniforms. “Back in the day, there was just us who was completely involved in the tailoring business and had our own factory,” recalls Kollavat.
Serbian female athletes were decked in striking skirts.
“I guess we have the experience and expertise that the pooyai (elders) of NOCT knew wouldn’t let them down. With sports, there’s also the issue of last-minute substitute athletes shuffling in and out. They know that we can deliver outfits for last-minute changes in time and have entrusted us with this honour.”
To many, the very word pooyai is a built-in code for old-fashioned. Usually Songsamai, which belongs to the old-school tailor class, comes up with a handful of designs for the pooyai of the committee to choose from — a somewhat bureaucratic process that usually takes months before the end product is hatched.
“They may not be too focused on flashy fashion,” says Kollavat. “They prefer something of international standards, something timeless that can be used for a long time.”
As an athlete who has to wear these clothes, Tanyatorn, the shooting athlete, says, “We usually stick to a traditional formal blazer, but it would be nice to have something smart casual for a change, because these ceremonies usually take a long time and require participants to be standing for hours.”
She name drops that Serbia and Ukraine had “cute dresses” worth looking into, but what’s interesting is that this year, the Thai team had four women and four men who were selected to wear the traditional dress made of blue silk and pink silk. The Thai silk touch is a nice one. “I think it would have been nicer if they are able to design an outfit to be both modern but also show the traditional Thai dress for the other athletes.”
This year’s Thai ensemble consisted of a snazzy, synthetic-silk gold blazer, a white shirt, dark slacks and orange ties for men and scarves for women. All athletes had to come in to get measured and synthetic silk, rather than real silk, was used to ensure the ease of being wrinkle-free for packing. The team could easily have passed for a 50s jazz band, but a deeper meaning — one that cannot be understood at a mere glimpse of the television screen — is attached to the usage of gold. Kollavat explains that the gold was used this year to honour the King, and other nations’ uniforms too hold stories or functions invisible to the eye. H&M’s colour-blocking ensembles for the Swedish team (which look like an Abba wardrobe malfunction crossed with jogging gear) are made from recycled bottles and garments, while South Korea’s painfully frills-free blue blazers and white slacks are infused with insect repellent to ward off mosquitoes.
But we all know that technology aside, first impressions are more lasting. The closing ceremony is another opportunity for teams to leave a lasting impression, even if this event is quieter because many athletes already have left Rio. Depending on how deep-pocketed or sophisticated each nation can afford to be, some nations may have a completely new outfit to parade around in on the last day, while others may wear the same outfit they did for the opening or simply come in the team’s tracksuit.
The Thai team has been known to sport tracksuits in the past, but we know that the US team will still be popping in new preppy numbers come the closing ceremony. Polo has conjured a more casual look where slacks turn to chino shorts and a blazer is swapped for a long-sleeved shirt to be worn over another striped tee. Yes, our national heroes should still be looking good, but this time, there’s leeway to be more casual and celebratory. The superhuman wins the medals, but the better dressed ones wins the hearts — and sometimes all it takes is the uniformity of some tri-coloured boat shoes.
Songsamai Rajthevee made the Thai team’s uniform for the opening ceremony.
Team USA’s opening ceremony uniform by Polo Ralph Lauren.
Korea’s uniform attempts to ward off the Zika virus.
Sweden’s team is dressed by H&M.
Team USA’s closing ceremony outfit comes in three colours athletes can choose from.
Many times, national committees fail to take matching shoes into account, which strengthens the uniformity of the total look. Above are shoes by Emporio Armani for the Italian team and Polo boat shoes for the US team.
This source first appeared on Bangkok Post Lifestyle.