Blank canvas: gender-neutral uniforms at the National Portrait Gallery

Staff at the National Portrait Gallery will be wearing new gender-neutral uniforms when it reopens this month.

The outfits include ties from charity shops, shirts and t-shirts made from recycled material and waistcoats designed to last long enough they can be handed down through the generations to new members of staff.

The gallery, which has been closed for a multi-million pound refit, said: “all items in the new uniform selection are intended to be gender-neutral, giving staff the freedom to choose from different options to best suit their individual needs, as well as seasons and occasions”.

Designer Wayne Hemingway said: “We don’t know of another uniform in the world that combines fabric offcuts and locally sourced materials and manufacturing, with pre-worn elements and fabrics made from waste.

“The National Portrait Gallery team have been fully supportive of this approach and helped push their new uniform to be such a sustainably ground-breaking one. We hope, this will be another reason to love this world-renowned cultural institution and most importantly to help attract forward thinking and caring team members.”

The gallery is set to reopen on June 22 after a £35 million refurbishment. Among the first attractions will be a new festival headlined by former Beatle Sir Paul McCartney who is taking part in an online conversation inspired by its exhibition of his photography from 1963-64 just as Beatlemania changed his life forever.

The photographs from his own personal archive have never been seen before and show the band in quiet moments away from the hordes of screaming fans and demands of their record company.