Some of you may already have heard through the London grapevine about the plans Wynn Abbott (as director of SciCult) and I (as editor of LabLit) have cooked up to hold a competition entitled Stripping Off the White Coat. We got some good coverage from the Guardian on Tuesday, and now it’s all hands on deck to make this event happens on schedule.
Good clean fun
It’s all in our press release, but basically, Wynn and I got to chatting at one of the Nature Network drink sessions down at The Lamb. Somewhere between our second and third pint, we realized we were both deeply perplexed that the basic design of the white coat has remained unchanged for more than a century, especially considering how radically science itself, to say nothing of society and fashion, has evolved. (OK, at some point the coats did start sporting snaps instead of buttons, but that hardly counts as a couture innovation.)
White coats do absolutely nothing to flatter either male and female figures; they are eminently unsexy and their lack of color amplifies every stain. More subversively, they perpetuate boffin stereotypes, while forcing a homogeneous, drab image onto people who tend to be, collectively, diverse, colourful and individual.
So SciCult and LabLit are challenging fashion designers, from students all the way up to celebs, to reinterpret lab coats for the 21st century. The brief: the coats must still discharge a protective function, but they must also be fun, fresh, sexy and original in design (like, for example, one of the conceptual sketches above, kindly knocked up by Vera Bravo, a talented London freelance illustrator).
We will make a formal call for designs within the next few months and our panel of judges will make a decision on the shortlist in autumn. If all goes to plan, we will coordinate with London Fashion Week in Spring 2008 and host a gala catwalk event at which the overall winner will announced. In addition to the main prize, we will also give out awards for the best accessories, such as gloves, masks and safety googles.
If anyone’s interested in getting involved or needs more information, let Wynn or me know!
So come on, people, pimp my coat! I’m tired of putting on the same old stained, shapeless one every morning.
Hi Jennifer, what a fun idea. I think it would be pretty cool to personalize the lab coat, or even lab furnitures. How about a “Grand Designs” program for labs, or a Trinny & Susannah type show for scientists?
There is actually a website that sells designer labcoats, but it’s hardly “couture”… http://www.thelabrat.com/Order.html
Hey cool, Jeff – I’m loving the faux cowhide version! Sadly they don’t sell outside of the United States.
What we are proposing is slightly different. There have always been novelty coats, but we’d like to try to inspire a change in the standard coat, and to stimulate people to think about why the custom has lingered and what it means on a deeper level.
But the couture angle will certainly add some spice!
I think Gene Roddenberry had the right idea. Even in space, thigh boots and mini-skirts can be practical.
Possibly! But just to note that ‘sexy’ does not necessarily mean ‘revealing’, as several people have reminded me on the LabLit fora. Lab coats do need to protect the wearer from experiments, and the experiments from the flora or nucleases of the wearer. I have in my mind my ideal lab coat, a fitted black number actually designed with the female form in mind. Men, too, could benefit from some fitting in the right places. 🙂
What a great idea! I’m thinking of a much slimmer silhouette for men, along the lines of Hedi Slimane’s and Kris van Asche’s designs for Dior Homme. In fact, a long black coat with a high military-style collar, epaulets, and generous pockets would not only look good, but be functional as well. I might try my hand at some sketches now..
Epaulets…yes. And shiny metal buttons! Adam Ant meets Metropolis. If you have ideas, we’d love you to save them up and enter the contest.
I always thought that it was odd that a coat customarily worn by men back in the day, and therefore presumably designed by men, could make men look so stodgy. Could it have been that anything even remotely stylish was perceived as ‘frivolous’ and therefore unbefitting of a ‘great man of science’?
I think modernizing the woman’s coat will be a bit trickier than the men’s – striking the right balance. It could be a fine line between fashionable and nurse-pervy!
This is brilliant! While I actually quite enjoyed the unshapely bagginess of the white coats, they always looked rather tired after a few experiments. It would be fun to have different styles and colours to chose from.
In the radiolabeling lab at the Paterson Institute we had to wear yellow labcoats and purple gloves. We looked like point sources even before we had spilled anything. This was definitely too eye-catching.
And I have no doubt that some of our competition entries will make ‘unshapely bagginess’ a design feature!
Empire-waisted Jane Austen-esque smock, anyone?
Congratulations on getting this off the ground!
Wynn mentioned it when I posted to psci-com about getting a lab coat project on Project Catwalk.
Sounds like you want something more practical, though I’d love to see the results of both!
Nah, it doesn’t have to be practical for the contest – I think the wilder the better, just to get people thinking about the underlying reason why we are so enslaved to the old model. Brasher designs will be more fun and will undoubtedly stimulate more interest.
Crazy coincidence that this idea was already floating around. Let’s join forces – especially if you bring the fairy cakes! But seriously, I’m a bit too cynical to think that Sky would be interested in science. And we want to have control over what happens.
Will you be accepting international submissions?
Why are they white anyway? Who needs to see all those burn marks and phenolphthalein stains?!
Hi Eva
Long time no chat. Yes, international submissions will be fine! Have something in mind?
Helen
I suspect that a certain class of scientist likes to show off his/her stains like badges of honor. The rest of us, however, just think ‘yuck’.
can anyone tell me if this contest is still accepting submissions? if so where do I sign up?