Berets are back for the U.S. Olympic team.

The team unveiled buttoned-up, refined uniforms designed by Ralph Lauren Tuesday for the opening ceremony at the London Olympics.

Men will wear navy blue blazers with the Olympic team patch, along with a red and navy tie, and cream-colored flat-front pants. Women will pair the blazers with scarves with red, white and blue stripes, and a knee-length cream-colored skirt.

All the team members will top off their uniforms with navy berets highlighted with red and white stripes.

The company said in a statement the outfits aim to embody "the spirit of American athleticism and sportsmanship."

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The Taipei city government's Department of Environmental Protection unveiled Tuesday an eco-friendly uniform for its cleaning team members to help improve their effectiveness and promote an image of the cleaners as heroes of the city. 

The uniforms, each set of which -- for summer and winter -- are made from 122 recycled PET bottles and 90 percent environmentally friendly materials, are vented and permeable for comfort, as well as being highly visible at night. 

The color of the uniform has also been changed from yellow to red to symbolize sincerity and courage, said the designers, Lo Li-te and Li Tai-yen of Green Smile Design, both of whom are winners of the International Design Excellence awards. 

The red uniform could also create a new image of the city's environmental protection work and drum up support for Taipei's bid for designation as the World Design Capital in 2016, Lo said. 

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The men and women in blue may be introduced to new lightweight wash-and-wear trousers.

The new pants might not look different, but they will be more practical for police officers.

Trouser pockets and being easy to wash will benefit police compared to the cost of caring for the current dry clean-only version.

In recent years the New Zealand Police operational uniform has evolved with stab resistant body armour (SRBA), new effective shirts and raincoats being introduced to meet the changing environment that police work in.

NZ Police chief media advisor, Grant Ogilvie says police will consider if there are better options appropriate for staff.

“This is part of an on-going process to ensure our staff are using the best equipment, including uniform, from both a safety and practical perspective.”

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Industrial design students recently completed a semester-long project designing uniforms for different law-enforcement agencies.

The industrial design program was approached by Horace Small, a uniform company owned by Vanity Fair Imagewear.

Vanity Fair Imagewear also owns several other apparel brands like Wrangler Jeans.

“Horace Small came to us and said that they were trying to reestablish themselves, and they came to us for conceptual ideas,” said Dylan Piper-Kaier, graduate student in industrial design.

The project began with large amounts of research, according to Rich Britnell, professor in industrial design.

Students participated in ride-alongs with the Auburn Police Department, the Auburn Fire Department and the Alexander City Fire Department.

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It is an opportunity of a lifetime for an up-and-coming Filipino-British designer to design the uniforms for the staff of one of the biggest malls in China.

Jennivi Jordan, who was born in Parañaque but grew up in London, will be designing the women’s uniform of Joy City Mall in Beijing, China.

The 28-year-old Jordan finished a degree in fashion design at the University for the Creative Arts in Epsom, England.

Her love for the arts encouraged her to pursue a career in the fashion industry.

“I suppose I’ve always been interested in arts. Since I was in school, my favorite subject was arts,” she said.

“And then it was a natural progress when I went to college I studied arts and design,” she added.

When it was her turn to choose a specific field for her university studies, she recalled she was torn between two subjects she loved in college--animation and design.

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U.S. Olympic track and field athletes will wear uniforms at the London Summer Olympics that Nike says could shave up to 0.023 seconds off 100-meter sprint times — a difference that could have elevated Walter Dix from bronze to the silver medal at the Beijing Olympics.

Dix still wouldn't have caught the fastest man in the world that day. Usain Bolt of Jamaica simply ran away from the field in the final, setting a world record that he would later break again.

But maybe these uniforms, with dimples that mimic a golf ball, could help the Americans close the gap on Bolt and his training partner, Yohan Blake.

The company said its tests showed an unexpectedly big difference in the 100-, 200- and 400-meter races. The outfits were unveiled Thursday evening in New York.

"We couldn't believe the numbers," said Martin Lotti, Nike's Olympics creative director. "That's not just the difference between first and second place, it's about making the podium."

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The Guelph Police Service is sporting a new look, a uniform change that is geared more towards performance than fashion, says Sgt. Doug Pflug.

Some of the former uniforms were made up of faded or mismatched shoulder patches, small pinned-on nametags, and they didn’t look consistent from officer to officer.

“It just didn’t have that corporate image that we wanted to have, and that consistency,” Pflug said. “We’re a professional organization and we want to look professional.”

On June 1, officers began wearing the new uniforms, with upgraded pants, shirt, duty belt and cap. The new outfits will have a stripe on the side of the pants that corresponds to the officer’s rank. A red stripe is for constables, a black stripe is for sergeants and staff sergeants and officers of a higher rank have a black stripe embroidered with Canadian leaves.

The nametags are sewn on instead of pinned to an officer’s shirt. They are also written in a bigger, more visible font.

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Acting in-charge director and chief Carolyn McDermed is one of six officers who will be wearing new police uniforms beginning Monday.

Lieutenants Mike Morrow, Brandon Lebrecht, Andy Bechdolt, and sergeants Brad Petrie and Michael Matchulat will join McDermed in the continuation of the campaign to add eight sworn police officers to DPS’ personnel by the beginning of the 2012-13 school year.

Officers with the rank of lieutenant or higher will wear a gold patch, emblazoned with “Police” across the top. Those below the lieutenant rank will wear patches containing blue. Currently the patches of the officers whom are not sworn officers wear patches that say “Public Safety Officer.”

“The officers wearing the uniforms are in leadership positions,” said DPS Communications Director Kelly McIver. “They are not out and about as much as our patrol officers, so there is not a great chance students will see them right away.”

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When people find a great new restaurant, they rave about the food, wine and decor. Rarely do they go away and say the uniforms worn by the staff were just as impressive. Chef Gordon Ramsay and L.A. movie designer Allison Leach are changing that, and diners at his new Gordon Ramsay Steak in the Paris are giving great reviews to the sexy outfits worn by the waiters and waitresses.

Allison is not my ex-wife, nor a sister or cousin -- pure coincidence that she’s also British and came from the same area of England as my father. But she does have the same eye for the sleek, sexy look.

“I was approached by the hotel and restaurant team as a Hollywood costume designer,” Allison told me. “Jeffrey Fredrick and Terrence O’Donnell wanted to execute their vision of unique, conceptual uniforms. They wanted a custom approach to push Las Vegas uniform design to a new level of fit, detail and mood -- to achieve a visual spectacle within a functional uniform, a look worthy of the food.

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Gone are the signature heavily-starched white tunics traditionally worn by Traffic Police motorcycle cops.

They have been replaced with modern biker jackets made of lightweight ballistic nylon reinforced with shoulder, elbow and spine guards.

Since the new uniforms were adopted early last month, the officers look like any other safety-conscious biker.

It's a step in the right direction. Perhaps what's more important here is the message - safety is a priority.

It's a message that will hopefully be picked up by bikers, says a police spokesman.

In some ways, the change in uniform reflects a solidarity with Singapore bikers - they share the same roads and the same passion for motorcycles.

Traffic Police patrol officers also get caught in the rain and get trapped in the heat. They are also vulnerable to crashes.

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