Philip Oakey - Personal Style

Personal Style

Throughout his career and in his personal life Oakey has been a very flamboyant dresser and fashion trend setter. His entry into music was precipitated by his reputation for style. His outrageous dress sense and original hairstyle would make him an iconic figure of the early 1980s music scene.

Pre-1977, during the era of Punk rock, Oakey adopted various styles; at one time having a crew cut but later he had collar length hair and had once turned up in one club wearing a household power lead with plug as a necklace. He also often wore bike leathers and rode a classic Norton motorcycle around Sheffield. His natural good looks combined with his flamboyant style was the main reason Martyn Ware invited him to join his pop band 'The Future' in 1977. Ware, who was chasing commercial success, reasoned that half the battle was won "as Oakey already looked like a pop star".

Soon after 'The Future' transformed into 'The Human League', Oakey as lead singer wanted a look that would make him stand out from other lead singers. After spotting a girl on a Sheffield bus with a Veronica Lake hair style, Oakey was inspired to adopt a strange lopsided geometric hairstyle, shoulder length on one side and short on the other. As the Human League increased in prominence the hairstyle would became Oakey’s trademark. Between 1978-1979 with his unique hairstyle he maintained a masculine dress style and at one time wore a full beard.

Increasingly interested in attracting the limelight and standing out from the crowd, in 1979 inspired by the 1970s Glamrock style of Brian Eno Oakey began wearing makeup; his style became increasingly more feminine including the use of bright red lipstick.

By 1981 after the formation of the Mk2 Human League, Oakey’s trademark style of the early 1980s was complete. As well as full make up, Oakey had begun wearing androgynous clothing, which he described as "neither male nor female". The addition of teenage school girls Susan Ann Sulley and Joanne Catherall as co-vocalists to the band in 1980 complemented his look. At times all three would wear the same eyeliner and lipstick. Oakey and Catherall, who were to enter into a relationship with each other, often looked and dressed almost identically.

The media regularly commented and joked about his style (unwittingly achieving Oakey's aim). Fearlessly Oakey pushed his unique style further and began wearing high heeled shoes. He already had both his ears pierced and wore dangling women’s diamante earrings. Keen to shock, on one of the 'new' Human League's posters in 1981 Oakey posed shirtless displaying pierced nipples linked together by a gold chain. Oakey says of his early 1980s style: "I deliberately wore clothes that either men or women could wear. But I don't think I ever really looked like a woman. And I never wore very masculine clothes".

Another common media error was that Oakey and The Human League were part of the New Romantic movement. Oakey and the band, whose look was unique and pre-dated the start of the Blitz Kids never identified with the New Romantic scene, although they seldom challenged the media label while it helped sell records. It wasn’t just a stage look and Oakey openly went about in public in full make up, dressed in his eclectic style, he claims that "Sheffield was so accepting that no one ever blinked an eyelid". Oakey jokes that when he sought parental permission for the girls to go on the 1980 tour, that the father of Susan Sulley (then aged 17) only let her go on tour with the Human League because "He wasn’t entirely sure I was a man."

After the international success of Dare, Oakey tired of the androgynous look and then by 1983 had adopted a more macho look of denim, collar length permed hair and the ill shaven ‘designer stubble’.

For the Crash album of 1986 Oakey adopted a smoother style of designer clothes of the period and a very manicured look which he says was inspired by Sean Young’s character ‘Rachael’ from the film Blade Runner.

By 1990 the Human League had seriously begun to decline. For their Romantic? album, Oakey wore denim, leather and readopted his lop sided hairstyle from 1981 in a rebellion against "the male model look of Crash". The band went through dark times and the style was quickly abandoned.

When the band returned in a comeback in 1995, the mature (then 40 year old) Oakey reappeared with designer clothes and a sauvé short neat hair cut.

In 1998 Oakey began to suffer from male pattern baldness and after advice from his hair stylist, in 1999 he adopted an all over ‘number two’ crop hairstyle. This is the style he wears today, albeit that his hair has now completely greyed.

Today Oakey is still known for his dapper style, but now generally wears a simple Armani suit on stage. Although he has not lost his desire to shock, and recently boasted during a newspaper interview that he had recently acquired a Prince Albert piercing, which he says "hurt less than having his ears pierced".