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United Federation of Planets
- Uniforms
History of Starfleet Uniform’s 2151 - 2405
This uniform
gallery shows illustrations from the year 2151, Uniform's, starting
with Enterprise NX-01 and then onto all series and movies. In the Original
Star Trek movies (2 through 6) we see officers wearing a consistent
uniform, which consisted of black boots and trousers, a burgundy
wrap-around top with white collar. This attire appears to have been
the standard duty uniform of Starfleet officers for quite a long time,
although there were a few variations of this theme.
In ‘TAPESTRY’ we can see that more or less the same uniform was in use in the early
to mid 24th century (Picard’s Q induced jaunt back to his reckless
youth). And in ‘FAMILY’ we see a holographic recording of Jack
Crusher, seen by Wes aged 18. Jack is wearing the same uniform. This
was made just after Wesley’s birth, allowing any of us to ascertain
that it was in general use around 2349 (some 18 years before ‘FAMILY’). So we know that this uniform was decommissioned between
this holographic recording and Jack Crusher’s death.
For in ‘VIOLATIONS’
we see a flashback of Crusher and Picard at the morgue to identify
Jack’s body. They were at that point wearing the more modern uniform
we see in the show’s first season, as they also were in Picard’s
Stargazer dream sequence in ‘THE BATTLE’. Seeing as Wesley
was 5 when Jack died, we can determine that the new uniform was
commissioned between 2349 and 2354. So the old burgundy uniform
reigned from at least the early 2280's (‘The Wrath Of Khan’) to
the mid 24th century, some 60-70 years.
There appears to
be a great inconsistency in the regularity of uniform commissioning
and usage. Since ‘ENCOUNTER AT FARPOINT’ the uniform has
changed several times. It became a lot fuller and less tight for the
third season, also gaining a collar. Further on, a belt was added, the
zipper was then at the back. Captain Picard sometimes wore (from the
5th season on) additional accessories to this theme, such as a jacket
with padded shoulders, and grey top beneath.
Then came the
introduction of a jump-suit, or (boiler suit) which was mainly all
black with command
indicated across the shoulders, this also included a new grey under
garment. Also, this addition to DS9 doesn’t seem to be used
ubiquitous throughout the ranks of Starfleet. Other visiting personnel
sometimes wear the older uniform, such as Captain Keogh in ‘THE
JEM’HADAR’, and Thomas Riker in ‘DEFIANT’. And in ‘Generations’
half the crew wore the old uniform and the other half the new one.
Riker wore the new one in ‘Generations’, yet in ‘DEATHWISH’ on ‘Voyager’ two years later, he is back to
wearing the old one again, complete with the old Combadge design.
Perhaps his other uniform was at the cleaners!
In DS9's 'THE
VISITOR' we see the future sequence of Captain Nog visiting a
middle aged Jake at his home. Nog is wearing the old TNG style
uniform. This whole situation at this point seems to be a bit of
shambles of continuity.
In the eighth
movie, ‘Star Trek: First Contact’, we see yet another new
uniform. Being mainly all black with a kind of corrugated grey effect
upon the shoulders. So we have one widely used uniform for about 65
years, and then the first season uniform lasts from the 2350’s to the
third season of TNG, around 2365.
From that time on
to the early 2370’s, and ‘First Contact’, we see the uniform
change persistently, 4 or 5 times with all the variations thereof –so
for a period lasting a couple of decades we see an unrealistic number
of changes to uniform when you take into account how long the burgundy
one endured. The creators certainly like to keep the costume
department busy.