Hannibal S2, Ep3 – Sakisuki
Costume Designer: Christopher Hargadon
That Blood Red Windowpane Suit
It’s in this episode we see perhaps the most famous suit from the series. The one that made a lot of photo shoots and thumbnails on Amazon Prime.
It’s certainly the most ostentatious suit that we’ve seen Hannibal wear yet. It’s a charcoal and red windowpane 3 piece suit. The red carries the sense of threat and we see a return of my favourite red and silk floral tie. Due to the similar cut and trademark Barchetta pocket I’ll assume it’s an Antonio Valente suit.
Thick Red Windowpane
As seen on every other blog
It’s the suit that you see as the profile photo on many ‘How to dress like Hannibal blogs’. Often with the vibrance filter amped to ten making the red look unnatural. It is very possible that Mads Mikkelsen took this suit home as I haven’t yet located it on the Prop Store auction.
Referring to an interview Mikkelsen did for Paste Magazine: (Link no longer available). See Below.
UPDATE:
In my interview with Christopher Hargadon he had this to say about that infamous Red Windowpane suit,
CH: Yeah, that was an amazing fabric. I really love that. I made the identical suit up for Brian Fuller. Because he was always quite covetous of Mads’ suits. And he’s like me, he’s about six foot five. You know, completely different. So I had to reorder some of that fabric. I have a picture of him somewhere standing together [with Mads] in the same suit.
PB: Do you mind me asking where the fabric came from? Can you remember?
CH: Yeah it came from an amazing fabric supplier out of Scotland. They’re called Holland and Sherry. Quite honestly, their Woollens are exquisite. And the thing that’s interesting with them is you can’t get if you order, for instance, a year from now, you won’t be able to get more of that fabric. I don’t know what they do with the left overs [remnants], but it’s no longer available. So I’ve had a lot of people over the years asked me, where they can get this particular pattern. And I can’t really be very encouraging because I haven’t been able to get more of it.
The fabric is stunning. I mean, to me, it’s my favourite as well. And also in the different lights. It reads differently. Sometimes the red really pops and then other times it’s sort of melds more into the grey, depending on whether it’s outside or inside. Yeah. Oh, good eye my friend because those are my favourites.
PB: And was this the one that Mads kept?
CH: I’ll tell you a story. I’ll get in trouble for this, I’m sure. But he [Mads] loved it so much that after the season that he wore it, I boxed it up and I left it with the production office to ship to him in Denmark because he’d already left. And then when I came back for the next season there it was sitting in the same place. I kind of rolled my eyes. And then I think it was the first or second script and the next season where he was wearing that suit in some kind of a flashback. And if that suit have travelled, I never would have been able to duplicate it because like I said the fabric was unattainable. So it was like, thank you.
Getting ready
We should go back to the beginning of the episode however because there is one of the more interesting tailoring moments of the series. Hannibal and Will are both getting dressed for their date in court. There are some nice shots of Hannibal getting prepared, although some continuity errors. Whilst a nice juxtaposition is drawn through Will being placed in handcuffs and in contrast, Hannibal applies his cufflinks, both are wearing button cuff shirts. It simply wouldn’t be possible.
Also Hannibal must have had a change of heart in wardrobe choice. This is not the suit we see him wear to court. That can be plausible, however Will’s suit is the one he wears to court and the Paul Smith maroon with grey stripes tie sold at auction for $600.
The weave
You can see some differences in the weave of the shirt. Hannibal has a waffle-weave dress shirt, the same kind of fabric that Turnbull & Asser used for Daniel Craig’s evening shirt in Casino Royale. Up close you can see it’s waffle effect.
More on shirts
Will Graham is wearing a herringbone weave shirt which is less fancy than Hannibals. But Will’s wardrobe has never been fancy, nor should it be for a court appearance. Just functional and inoffensive. For more on shirts I’d recommend reading The Jermyn Street Shirt by Jonathan Sothcott.
Credits & Disclaimer & Further Reading
- Jonathan Sothcott Talks about his New Book – The Jermyn Street Shirt | #130
- It’s a Suitable Life – Hannibal Season 2
- The Casino Royale Dinner Jacket
All screen grabs taken from the Hannibal Series currently streaming on Amazon Prime. Used here under the fair use doctrine. If you don’t have Prime Video you can buy the box set on DVD & Blu Ray below.
