Otomes' dress uniforms

Following on from a few notes I made on another thread and with particular reference to a couple of interesting details The Fire Stirring Ruby picked up on & brought to my attention, I thought I might be worthwhile to have a closer look at the dress uniforms of the Otomes - and especially the iconography displayed thereon.

In general, the dress uniform displays a pair of wings signifying that the wearer carries the rank of Meister, as well as the logo of the nation which she represents or, in the case of the Five Columns, the Otome's alphanumeric designation (A, II, III, IV, V) and a roughly symmetrical abstract device or pair of devices. It's interesting to note that, while six of the ten Columns shown on screen share three GEMs, all of these devices are unique. As for the wings, they normally appear at the top of the uniform, though a variant, placing them towards the midriff, occurs in two cases - Haruka Armitage & Fiar Grosse. As such, this seems to be more of an individual preference than any particular national style. Other devices do appear to have a national basis: uniforms belonging to Meisters representing Wind Bloom & Lutesia Remus have various additions (thanks again to Ruby for noting this).

I will provide images below based on the country or entity served: -

Garderobe

Five Columns

Bewitching Smile Amethyst


Unfortunately, the details of Una's dress uniform are unclear as her sartorial tastes lean more towards power dressing.

Ice Silver Crystal


Emulating her predecessor, Natsuki prefers other attire, so this is a rare outing for the dress uniform. Rocking that cape.

Galactic Aquamarine

♥ Elli-chin!!! :3 ♥

others


Perhaps a cultural element, Mahya wears an elaborate headdress. Here she is without, displaying her wings of office: -


Miss Maria

The only member of the teaching staff I recall having seen in the ceremonial dress uniform is Miss Maria. Here she is from Sifr: -

Note the kite device associated with the wings, which I suspect may be an emblem of seniority, signifying the completion of a certain number of years in service. Also, the heraldic emblem at the bottom may be unique to her or it could perhaps represent two flowers: Miss Maria hails from "Old Lutesia," before the division into Romulus & Remus, both of which are represented by flowers.

Here she is in AR 330, looking especially stern & indomitable: -


Wind Bloom

In total, three Otomes from Wind have appeared in their dress uniforms.

Whilst Lena & Arika wear the same uniform in the anime series, Lena's uniform is slightly different in Sifr: -

Instead of having Wind's compass logo on her shoulders as do the others, it now appears over her midriff. The two red chevrons at the bottom of the apron are also transformed into kites (the Otome of Bruce's predecessor also has kites, albeit green).

In addition, Wind Otomes also have emblems associated with the wings. In the case of Lena & Arika, these take the form of a red HiME Star-shaped device pretty much identical to that which appears on the Coral Star Class uniform.

Altai

Altai is quite unusual in that there are no native Meisters shown before Nina, whose uniform displays some significant differences from the norm.

Note that, instead of wings, Nina's uniform has stylised tongues of flame (which kinda look like her pigtails if you squint) with a diamond shape above. This is similar to the Valkyrie dress uniform, with the addition of Altai's crossed-hammers-and-chain logo: -

The major difference is the position of the diamond, which is beneath the "flames" on the uniform of the Valkyries: on Nina's uniform, it shares its position with Arika's "Coral star." It's also worth noting that, whilst she operates as the Valkyrie unit's field commander, Tomoe's uniform has no significant difference from Chie's which would reflect this status.

The other Otome associated with Altai is Sakura Hazakura, whose dress uniform is more likely a reflection of her homeland of Taiyuan: -


Aries


Haruka's uniform is noteworthy due to the lower position of the wings vis-à-vis the national emblem, which appears on her left breast. This is note the case with Chie's dress uniform, which appears to be more generic: -


Chaldea

Like Haruka, Fiar Grosse's wings appear lower on her uniform, and, like Miss Maria, they are associated with a kite device: -

Akane opts for the more standard approach: -


Florince

All three dress uniforms from this country are pretty much identical, though differ somewhat from the other countries by incorporating the country's colours (which, appropriately for the Earl version of France, is based upon the tricolore - which lends significant irony to the fact that the country's flagship is called the Marie Antoinette!): -


Not sure at all about the ties...

Lutesia

Romulus



Remus


Like Windbloom, Remus makes use of other devices on Laula's uniform, with a red diamond just below the wings and a kite beneath the country's flower logo.

Annam



Zipangu


The variant on the mitsudomoe appearing on Mai's uniform is, in my opinion, the Tokiha family crest (Zipangu as a whole seems to be represented by a stylised letter "Z").

Earl Church


Raquel's dress uniform is quite unusual, having some similarities with monastic garb, appropriate for an Otome in the service of the Church.

Break String SpinElf wrote:Miss Maria

The only member of the teaching staff I recall having seen in the ceremonial dress uniform is Miss Maria. Here she is from Sifr: -

This is an off-hand comment, but the "flower" underneath the younger Miss Maria's uniform looks oddly... familiar. It looks like the logo of the Five Columns, or is that just me?

Can someone jog my memory if the Five Columns logo was ever shown during S.ifr? In my opinion, I think Miss Maria, as the interim headmistress of Garderobe, adopted the Lutesian flower for the Five Columns.

I think we both agree that as the meister GEM is passed along, the customized insignias on the Otome formal robes change, no?

The Fire Stirring Ruby wrote:This is an off-hand comment, but the "flower" underneath the younger Miss Maria's uniform looks oddly... familiar. It looks like the logo of the Five Columns, or is that just me?

Can someone jog my memory if the Five Columns logo was ever shown during S.ifr? In my opinion, I think Miss Maria, as the interim headmistress of Garderobe, adopted the Lutesian flower for the Five Columns.

Once again, I'm in your debt, Ruby. Excellent spot.

Given this, I think my flower idea was a red herring. If anything, the Five Columns' sigil looks like the "above ground" portion of the Founder's shrine: -

Nonetheless, I quite like the idea that Miss Maria somehow based it on twin Lutesian flowers as a memorial to her now-divided homeland.

The Fire Stirring Ruby wrote:I think we both agree that as the meister GEM is passed along, the customized insignias on the Otome formal robes change, no?

Quite. They all appear quite abstract too, with the exception of Nao's which, being in the shape of a spider, is more of a shout out to Julia. Of the others, only Eliot's appears recognisable: it is a dead ringer from her boomerang-like element: -

Break String SpinElf wrote:Quite. They all appear quite abstract too, with the exception of Nao's which, being in the shape of a spider, is more of a shout out to Julia. Of the others, only Eliot's appears recognisable: it is a dead ringer from her boomerang-like element

Great observation. But having a customized insignia is somewhat contrary to that of the Chaldean Empire, as evidenced here:

Break String SpinElf wrote:Chaldea

Like Haruka, Fiar Grosse's wings appear lower on her uniform, and, like Miss Maria, they are associated with a kite device: -

Akane opts for the more standard approach: -

Looking at it, the insignias are the same. Although I'm sure that Akane could have her own, she opted for the traditional Chaldea logo though the reason would most likely simply because of her love for Kazuya Krau-xeku, the reigning king.

I think it is more of to the discretion of the Otome what kind of insignia she would like to have embroidered or printed on her formal robe.

The Fire Stirring Ruby wrote:

Break String SpinElf wrote:Quite. They all appear quite abstract too, with the exception of Nao's which, being in the shape of a spider, is more of a shout out to Julia. Of the others, only Eliot's appears recognisable: it is a dead ringer from her boomerang-like element

Great observation. But having a customized insignia is somewhat contrary to that of the Chaldean Empire, as evidenced here:

Break String SpinElf wrote:Chaldea

Like Haruka, Fiar Grosse's wings appear lower on her uniform, and, like Miss Maria, they are associated with a kite device: -

Akane opts for the more standard approach: -

Looking at it, the insignias are the same. Although I'm sure that Akane could have her own, she opted for the traditional Chaldea logo though the reason would most likely simply because of her love for Kazuya Krau-xeku, the reigning king.

I think it is more of to the discretion of the Otome what kind of insignia she would like to have embroidered or printed on her formal robe.

That's a good point, particularly as Akane was actually born in Florince (it's worthwhile noting that, in the first episode of Zwei, when the locations of the Otome are shown on a map in Yohko's lab [16.21-23], the homelands of the Otome appear rather than the country of their allegiance). Not a great pic but here's Akane's (you can just about make out the name of Florince at the top left): -

With the possible exception of Florince (which seems to operate a "one uniform fits all" approach), there does appear to be considerable leeway in terms of uniform design.

Following on from the above, does anyone have any idea why certain Coral uniforms deviate from the norm?

The standard Coral uniform comes with an apron whose trim is roughly cerulean in colour, matched by a zigzag in the same colour towards the top of the stockings, a look modelled here by the lovely Erstin Ho: -

Some characters, though, have different coloured trims & zigzags: -

Nina (green)

Tomoe (mauve)

Arika (pink)

Mai (orange) & Natsuki (sky blue)

They even appear in Saga: here are Ayane (pink) & Nicola (mauve).

Obviously, it could be a matter of the highest ranking pair in each year having the honour of wearing a colour of their choice, perhaps a national colour. However, Arika, who is initially ranked 51st, also has a "custom" uniform. In addition, the uniforms of both Shizuru & Haruka, who would presumably represent the top two Corals from the year before Mai & Natsuki entered Garderobe, also feature the standard cerulean.

To add further confusion, whilst the standard Pearl uniform features yellow apron trim, with the number 1 Pearl wearing red, Natsuki's Pearl uniform again features sky blue trim: -


Any ideas?

Having covered the anime, in the interests of completeness, I've decided to post yet more photos, this time from the manga.

Garderobe

Shizuru's dress uniform in the manga appears to be pretty much the same as it is in the anime, though Natsuki's has some slight differences: in particular, the "thunderbolt" devices flanking the II are not present, whilst she has a small star between the wings: -

Nice ShizNat moment there.

Here's the detail of Shizuru's apron.

Wind Bloom

Again, Arika's dress uniform shows subtle differences between the two media. The sigil between the wings is formed of a kite & chevron rather than a "Star class" star, whilst, at the bottom of the apron, the devices echo the Wind Bloom compass.


Altai

Meanwhile, Nina is shown in her dress uniform, which has the crossed hammers of Altai on a shoulder patch. Similar to Arika's uniform, Nina has a symbol between the wings formed of two wing-like structures above & either side of a "beak."


Chaldea

Once more, the Chaldean Empire takes the biscuit in terms of design: Akira's dress uniform is simply awesome and has a good claim to be the best from either the manga or the anime. Check out this beauty!

Interestingly, only one of the stylised wings which represent Chaldea is visible close to her left shoulder, whilst the apron itself is blank (barring the punctuation mark superimposed in the second shot :3).

Her compatriot Layla Mariposa appears in her robe: her dress uniform only features in a flashback of Natsuki's, and even then it's from behind. The only feature of note is the shoulder patch.

Shinso-sama

I've realised that I've missed pretty much the ultimate biggie thus far in the form of the Founder herself. Here she is: -

The most striking feature (and it is indeed striking) is that Fumi is depicted not with two Meister wings, but with four. She also has a diamond motif similar to Nina's, as well as a kite-type device in gold beneath the wings.