A Brown Windowpane Suit as Sir Hilary Bray in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service

Original article published 27 January 2012

I am in the process of rewriting and revising old articles about James Bond’s outfits that need a refresh and expansion. All former comments are preserved below.

A significant portion of On Her Majesty’s Secret Service puts George Lazenby’s James Bond in disguise as genealogist Sir Hilary Bray from the College of Arms, played by George Baker. Bond meets with Sir Hilary at the College of Arms in London and later wears the same suit, Inverness coat and glasses as part of his disguise.

The three-piece suit is made of a heavy thornproof tweed or worsted tweed. It’s much smoother than a Harris Tweed, without the hairiness or irregularities, and it has a tight twill weave that makes it suit-worthy, so the trousers keep a sharp crease. It is dark brown with a beige tic pattern and an orange windowpane. The brown colour and tweedy look lend Sir Hilary and Bond’s disguise an appropriately scholarly look. The suit shares traits with what Bond would normally wear, but it contrasts with most of what Bond wears in this film. It’s supposed to look like the kind of suit that Bond wouldn’t own himself, but it’s in the same family as Bond’s houndstooth hacking jacket.

This suit was made by Dimi Major, who made all of Lazenby’s suits for On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, as well as suits for other actors in the film. This suit jacket has the same overall cut as the rest of Lazenby’s suits in the film, but it appears to be slightly more relaxed. The shoulders are lightly padded and slightly extended. The jacket features a button-two front with classic hacking details such as a deep single vent and steeply angled hip pockets with flaps. This jacket lacks a ticket pocket, which is commonly found on hacking jackets. The lapels are a medium width of approximately 3 1/2 inches, and the front and pocket edges are swelled for a sporty look. This jacket has three cuff buttons, matching the rest of the suits in the film, and all the buttons are made of mottled dark brown unpolished horn.

Though George Lazenby and George Baker are similar in size, separate suits were made for both actors, judging by how the pattern lines up on the chest, lapels and collar.

This suit’s waistcoat has six buttons down front, worn with the bottom button open. The waistcoat has four welt pockets on the front. Sir Hilary himself wears a gold watch chain across the lower pockets, but he’s also wearing a small gold wrist watch. A waistcoat with a country suit does not make it a more formal suit than a two-piece suit. It only makes it a warmer suit for cool, damp weather.

The trousers have double forward pleats like the suit trousers Sean Connery previously wore as Bond, with a medium-width straight leg and turn-ups. The pleats are stitched down at the top for about an inch to direct the fullness further down the hips and create a neater line. They tighten at the waist with Daks-style button side-adjusters. The side pockets are slanted, and Bond rips out the pocketing to use as mittens. The trousers have raised side seams, adding to the sporty look. Compared with Bond’s usual trousers in the film, the fuller cut of these trousers gives this suit a much more traditional look, more than any other detail.

The shirt from Frank Foster is made of a heavy brushed cotton twill with a tattersall check. The check consists of tan and brown lengthwise stripes with navy and olive crosswise stripes on an ecru ground. The shirt is a classic English country shirt, contrasting with Bond’s preferred shirts made of finer cotton. The shirt has a slightly short spread collar, a plain front and rounded single-button cuffs. The collar contrasts with the narrower point collars Bond usually wears in this film, further differentiating this outfit from his own, though this collar is still narrower than Bond’s shirt collars in the previous Connery films. The collar is rather short as well, with points only about 2 3/4 inches long.

The narrow tie is a navy repp with a large coat of arms high on the front blade, fitting for a genealogist. The coat of arms has two gold lions rampant flanking a red shield with a gold sailing ship. A gold crown—possibly a knight’s crown—is the crest at the top of the design. There’s a banner at the bottom of the coat of arms that likely contains a motto. Bond ties the tie in a Windsor knot, matching what he usually ties in the film. Sir Hilary himself ties a much smaller four-in-hand, a knot more fitting for a man who favours such traditional clothes. Sir Hilary is wearing a dark navy silk pocket square prominently puffed in the out-breast pocket. Bond also has something in his breast pocket, but it appears to be a case for his glasses, which he slides the glasses into after he’s alone in his room at Piz Gloria. This is not Bond’s pocket square era.

The shoes are light brown full-brogue, wing-tip, three-eyelet derbies with chunky black crepe soles. The socks appear to be black, though they could be dark brown. In any case, the socks are too dark for both the shoes and the suit and don’t provide a smooth transition between the two.

Bond also wears Sir Hilary’s small, round tortoise-shell glasses, a key part of the disguise. Bond’s glasses have plain lenses, which is one thing that blows his cover.

Over the suit, Bond keeps warm outdoors in snowy Switzerland with an Inverness coat, a tweed trilby, a tan scarf and sheepskin gloves. The Inverness coat, made of rough and heavy rust-brown tweed, may be mistaken for the more common Inverness cape, which does not have sleeves. Bond’s coat and hat match those hanging on the rack in Sir Hilary’s office at the College of Arms. Either Bond had his own clothes made for his disguise, or he’s wearing Sir Hilary’s own clothes because the two men are similar in size.

The Inverness coat is an old Victorian style of a knee-length single-breasted coat with a cape attached, which fell out of favour after the Edwardian era. It is a costume-like piece, even for a man a generation older than Sir Hilary himself, and if the rest of his clothes didn’t already make Sir Hilary look old-fashioned, this coat is the icing on the cake. The coat is tailored with soft shoulders, a Prussian collar, straight jetted pockets, a rear vent and set-in sleeves with a single-button closure. The coat’s buttons are mottled dark brown, unpolished horn.

The tweed trilby has a subtle plaid pattern in dark brown and light blue with a burnt orange overcheck running through it that matches both the rust colour of the coat and the orange windowpane in the suit underneath. The ribbon is in the same material. The trilby has a teardrop crown with a front pinch and a narrow brim that is sharply turned up in the back. The thick, camel-coloured sheepskin gloves have a fur self-lining to keep Bond’s hands warm in frigid outdoor conditions while providing him with a minimum of dexterity.

Bond travels lightly as Sir Hilary, with only one suit, one coat, a cardigan and highland dress. He mixes parts of his initial outfit with other pieces. He wears the Inverness coat over his highland dress when meeting Blofeld in his cavern lair. He also wears the same shirt, suit trousers and shoes casually with a cardigan, as these pieces lend themselves to dressing down. The camel-coloured cardigan has a five-button front, raglan sleeves, and open patch pockets. Bond sometimes leaves the top button open and folds back the cuffs. Daniel Craig and his portrayal of James Bond were part of the wave of the 21st-century cardigan revival, but for Lazenby’s cover as Sir Hilary Bray, the cardigan is the look of an uncool, stodgy older man. Bond lacks the cool cardigan look of Steve McQueen, despite both men wearing a cardigan in the same colour.

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