With the “Star Wars” universe serving as the DNA for Disney+’s “Andor,” costume designer Michael Wilkinson could be honoring a legacy while leaning into a new world.
For Diego Luna’s Cassian, Wilkinson draped it in warm, earthy tones with textured fabrics.
When audiences first meet him, he wears “a beautiful oilcloth of old leather jackets with signature details such as a high collar and hood”. In the end, the silhouettes become slimmer and more streamlined.
“He has a beautiful bespoke long linen coat that we made for him that moves beautifully for all the action sequences. It is an adult silhouette.
To outfit Genevieve O’Reilly’s Mon Mothma, he looked at figures, including high-profile senators and members of the United Nations, with power dressing in mind. “I was imagining what the futuristic off-planet version would look like,” he says. “I leaned into pale neutrals.”
Her senatorial blue robe with gold lining is “extremely architectural and quite austere,” says Wilkinson. “With her, there was a lot of adventurous tailoring and an exploration of silhouettes and layering that we did in her costumes, which reflects her sophisticated sense of aesthetic.”
Mon Mothma’s clothes for more private moments “where the mask slips” suggest another side of her personality. Wilkinson softened her figure when Tay Kolma (Ben Miles) visited, for example, giving her outfit a flowing look.
“It almost looks like a dressing gown,” he says. “That private look contrasts a lot with her senator robes.”
He was able to explore a duality for Stellan Skarsgård’s Luthen Rael, an antique dealer and the leader of a start-up rebellion seeking to bring down the Galactic Empire. “Luthen had this beautiful layering of velvety textures and premium fabrics,” he says.
The jewelry was custom-made, as Wilkinson was “inspired by brushed titanium and rare metal rings.”
When Rael lends his support to a growing rebel alliance, he wears a linen poncho.
“He’s a doer when he’s not around,” Wilkinson said. “We’re moving from jewel tones to an earthy look with natural fabrics like linen and cotton.”
The stark white costumes worn on the Narkina 5 Imperial Prison complex proved to be a design challenge. Crisp white, they must have felt mass-produced and disposable.
“It was a costume worn by hundreds and seen in three episodes. I knew I wanted the outfits to be crisp white with strong graphics,” says Wilkinson. “So I used a heat press to fuse the orange graphics onto this white paper-like fabric that we found had a high-tech feel.”