In February 1997, at a match in the United Kingdom, a young footballer for Manchester United was introduced to a just-as-young member of what would become the biggest girl band in Britain (and then, the world). Of course, he already knew who she was. She, on the other hand, would admit years later in an interview that she didn’t: “I was never into football.”
Fate intervened, and just a week later she attended another game, where he asked for her number—she wrote it down on, what else, a plane ticket.
Lo, Posh and Becks emerged, into the primordial celebrity whorl of the ’90s. While they’re still going strong nearly 30 years into their decorated careers—sports for David, and pop music and fashion (and now fragrances) for Victoria—I along with many others was struck by more than just their enduring romance, or their robust professional lives, while watching their mini-docuseries Beckham, which began streaming this month on Netflix.
For me, it was the airport outfits.
The images unearthed throughout the documentary are a cacophony of ’90s and early 2000s style: Victoria and David arriving in some far-flung destination, she in a little Gucci dress, he in a white tank top and khakis. At another departures terminal, both of them carrying matching Louis Vuitton bags up to the check-in counter. Even when they traveled solo, they were at their chicest post-baggage claim: David with flaxen curtain bangs and a cream jumper, flanked by a wall of luggage; Victoria in signature Posh Spice leathers strutting across an airport’s carpeted floors.
The Beckhams had an outsize impact on the celebrity style game. According to the photographers Eamonn and James Clarke, both interviewed in Beckham, the effect Posh and Becks had on the workings of the media industry was so significant that even the Clarkes and their fellow paparazzi had to learn more about fashion—which handbag Victoria was carrying, which shoes and glasses David was wearing. Wherever they went became their runway, and everyone paid close attention. As Anna Wintour, global editorial director of Vogue and chief content officer of Condé Nast (which owns and publishes Traveler), says in the documentary’s first episode, “When you have two equally charismatic people, it doubles the volume. It puts the heat factor way up.”
