Editor’s Note: The following contains mild spoilers for Loki Season 2 Episode 3.

The Big Picture

Christine Wada, the costume designer for Loki, discusses the challenges of maintaining a seamless transition between seasons while honoring the characters and story established in the first season. The TVA uniforms in the show draw inspiration from NASA photographs, with personalized details added to reflect the characters’ individuality within the homogenized setting. The costume designer reveals her excitement for Episode 3, which featured the World’s Fair setting, as well as her enjoyment in designing costumes for Sylvie and Loki. She also expresses interest in directing in the future.

Amidst all the time travel shenanigans, conspiracies, and new variants, one thing that stands out in every episode of Loki is the way the show seamlessly transitions between time periods, jumping from the brutalist style of the TVA to 1980s midwest America to the Chicago World’s Fair in 1893, the series doesn’t hesitate in plunging us into a new setting every week and the show doesn’t hold back when it comes to the look of each of these time periods. In Season 2, we see Loki (Tom Hiddleston) and Mobius (Owen Wilson) and the rest of the TVA struggle to deal with the fallout after the death of He Who Remains (Jonathan Majors). As they scramble to try and fix the temporal loom at the heart of the TVA, they’re forced to journey through time and track down leads that might help them before the destruction of the TVA.

Looking at the sumptuous costuming of the series, we spoke with costume designer Christine Wada about her work on both seasons of the show. She talked about where she drew her inspiration from when it comes to the TVA uniforms, styling characters like Sylvie (Sophie Di Martino), Loki, and Ravonna Renslayer (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), her favorite characters to dress, some of the details we might have missed from the show, and whether or not she’s interested in directing. Alongside Loki, Wada is known for her work on Our Flag Means Death, Bridesmaids, Altered Carbon, and more.

Image via DIsney+

COLLIDER: As the costume designer for both seasons of this show, can you talk about the biggest challenges that you have when it comes to working with the show and transitioning from the first season to the second season?

CHRISTINE WADA: The biggest challenge is trying to not up your game too much that you just take everybody out of a world that was pretty perfectly crafted, I’d say, in the first season, so that you just feel that it’s a continuation to the first season. I’ve never designed a second season before, but my first tendency, and I think it’s just a natural tendency, is to think that you’ve got to sort of top yourself, but then I quickly realize that these are characters and this is a world that the audience has become quite attached to and that the most important part of my process is to honor that and to continue telling that same story. So, it is difficult because you want to maintain that, you want it to feel seamless and that it’s a real continuation of the same story.

Obviously, when we’re at the TVA, they all have a very homogeneous look, and I’ve noticed that there are little details on everybody’s clothing that kind of singles them out as a person. How do you go about that process of sort of customizing the uniform or costume for each of these characters in this homogenized space?

WADA: Well, in some of the original research for the first season of Loki, I looked at a lot of NASA photographs, and just what people were wearing when it was like the moon launch and the control and command center, and the different variations. Even though there’s obviously a dress code, people personalize things, right? No matter what, it’s like giving a kid a school uniform, they’re always going to personalize it. So, in my approach, there was that element of like, “Yes, the TVA can strip away all of your past and sort of make you this worker bee in this sort of social structure, but there’s always going to be a little tendency to personalize.” Then, there is also the consideration of hierarchies and trying to really create some levels of hierarchy within that system.

I also noticed that all of the ties have a square bottom, which I thought was very interesting for all the characters. When we’re looking at this full season, there have been some amazing costumes, I think, especially in this most recent episode where we’re going back to the World’s Fair. I love Ravonna’s costume the most; I think she looks amazing. Do you have an episode that you were the most excited to sort of see come to life?

WADA: I would say I was really excited to see Episode 3 come to life for sure. I mean, of course, there are ones that I can’t talk about, but 100% was so looking forward to seeing how it would all work together and the Midway because we worked really hard in trying to be as authentic to the World’s Fair as possible and give it, still, a Loki feel. So I think we managed to do both those things. But in saying that, I also really enjoyed doing the ‘70s because I thought it was a great segue from the TVA. Having just been in the TVA for that amount of time in Episode 1 to then just be rocketed into a dramatically different and glamorous world felt really right for the story and really fun to do costume-wise to get a little glamour in, and especially with Wunmi, to be able to give her a glamour moment.

Image via Disney+

Oh, that’s true. She did! She had a great costume in that scene, too. When it comes to dressing this cast, obviously each character has their own personality, like we were saying. How do you approach it when it comes to their specific wardrobe, like for the actors specifically or the characters? Does each person have a color scheme, or is there a recurring theme?

WADA: Yes, because it all comes from their character, right? So, for instance, Tom, there are just things that a Loki is going to choose aesthetically, I think, that are so built into that character and also just built into Tom’s physicality, right? So, like the turning up of the collar, the way things fit, the silhouette is always so specific to Tom. And with a Sylvie, I think that her character always needs to feel like it’s on the run, so I think the movement in the clothing is always important, and the aging of her clothing is always important to make it feel that there’s history because there is history. Also, her swagger as a character, I think always comes from that androgynous sort of mobility, always kind of ready for battle. Even if she wants to live a regular life, there’s always a part of her that’s on edge. I do love her androgyny.

This season, I love that big coat that she’s wearing, too. The little houndstooth coat that she has over everything. It’s very comfortable, but also like she’s ready to leave at any moment.

WADA: Right. Exactly. And a nod to her trying to live a Loki version of a normal life, and the houndstooth being a little bit of a nod to the ‘80s.

Definitely. It’s a great costume, and I like when she just snaps, and she goes back to her old outfit. It’s like, “Okay, yeah, she’s always ready to get into action.”

WADA: Then in response to Renslayer, I think that she’s always straddled, character-wise, what does strength mean in terms of masculine and feminine, and what are silhouettes that reflect strength that can be both masculine and feminine? So I think with her costume, even in this season, the color choice leans into that a little bit, can kind of straddle both a masculine and a feminine side. Then the suit itself is actually a bicycle-riding suit from that era. It’s actually pants, which is culottes.

I love that. I did not realize that they were pants.

WADA: Yeah. They existed in the era, but women didn’t really wear pants in that era, except for those.

Image via Disney+

There’s obviously a wide range of styles as we’re going through this show, in Season 1 as well as 2, because we’re obviously jumping through time. When you’re looking for inspiration for this show, do you turn to anything other than obviously historical documentation and things like that? Is there something that you’re always like, “Okay, this is where I can go to sort of re-up my creative juices?” So to speak.

WADA: I definitely love a fabric store. I think fabric stores, textiles, always give me a lot of inspiration, but so does art for color palette, for texture. Like, in the end of Season 1, really looking towards a brutalist language was very helpful in all those details you pointed out in the TVA uniform. And of course, talking to the production designer is also another huge part of my references. I like to also dig deep into real life inspiration, like real people from history, to use that as a launching point as well.

It’s really fun to see your twist on it because, obviously, these are not characters who live in the times, so they kind of have little touches of, not modernity, but I guess out of time, sort of asynchronous style. I enjoyed that a lot. Just looking at this show, obviously, there are many characters. Do you have a favorite character that you like to dress or you look forward to designing and thinking up ideas for?

WADA: Well, that’s just such a tough question because I think every single one– For me, so much of a costume designing is so in the moment, so every single one I do I think is my favorite one basically. [Laughs] But it has been really fun to travel through this with Tom and Sophia, and just go through Season 1 and Season 2.

I love the green accents on all of the Lokis. That’s my favorite part to look for, like, “Oh, there’s some piping there that’s green, and a little bit of that personality.” Do you have a favorite piece from Season 2? Obviously, there’s a lot. I mean, I love those culottes, but maybe there’s something that you enjoyed seeing in the character?

WADA: I loved Tom’s ‘70s tuxedo, but I also really loved General Dox’s uniform in the war room because there’s this, and I don’t know that it’s very visible from the camera angle, but the details, her swag on her shoulders, is actually the Timekeepers. It’s actually beaded, it’s all beaded, the Timekeeper heads.

Image via Disney+

Oh, wow. Oh gosh, I need to go back and take a look at that.

WADA: It’s hard to see from that angle, but yes. I would say there’s details on that costume that are so magnificently crafted. I just wish you could see it more.

I always feel that. Once I see the picture when they display costumes, it’s like, “Oh, there’s all these little things that I wish we got to see a little bit closer!” They could just linger the camera there a couple minutes. So I was just talking to Kasra [Farahani], and I talked to Dan Deleeuw last week, and they both obviously have roles in this show that are not directing, but they are directors. Do you have any aspirations for directing next, or you’re fine where you are with costume, and you’ve got a lot on your hands?

WADA: I’d love to direct. Definitely. I think I even told somebody on Our Flag Means Death, I was like, “Can I just do Season 2? Can I direct a Season 2?” Well, only things that I know, characters that I know so well. I feel that there’s a real value to knowing these characters so well when you get to do multiple seasons or even just one really tough season of a show, and especially as a costume designer. You are really carving out what those characters are gonna be and where they’re gonna go, so you have to get to know them if you’re doing your job well. As a costume designer, you’re getting to know them really well to inform your design decisions.

You can watch Loki Season 2 on Disney+.

Loki Release Date June 9, 2021 Cast Tom Hiddleston, Owen Wilson, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Richard E. Grant Main Genre Superhero Genres Superhero