By Anne von Loebbecke / February 2023
SPORTS INFLUENCE ON FASHION
Even global sports participation has been decreasing in the last 10 years, during the pandemic in 2021, sport & fitness participation hit its highest level in over 6 years at 237M (+7.8% vs the lowest point in 2016). It comes to no surprise that the increase in sporting activity fostered the influence on fashion.
Over the centuries, the sports & fashion industries are coming together even more and sports stars are beginning to set trends the way models do. As a result, wearing sports cloths isn’t just becoming a norm everywhere but is also considered high fashion.
Many people recognize how sportswear anesthetizes the body. This has led to a sporty look trend as many people can be spotted wearing a baseball cap or yoga pants without being interested in either of the sports themselves. This trend is pushed even further by young athletes who embrace the merge of sports & fashion with a fresh mindset & attitude and who bring in the younger generation audiences. who are in love with the sporty look. Additionally, young designers are bringing a new spin to the sport through the use of streetwear in fashion.
So, how did sports influence fashion happen?
From Court to Catwalk
Tennis was the first sport to inspire the great designers of our time. Jane Regny & Suzanne Lenglen were two tennis players who moved over to design some everyday activewear in Paris. The two recognized the importance of style & comfort and sought new ways to combine these in their designs. By the 1920s, the prep look was now a top option for the rich. In addition, college spring breakers took the style beyond the tennis court & kickstarted sport’s influence in fashion. Today, as GenZs continue to deploy the social platforms focusing on the video platform TikTok, one of the generations most loved styles is wearing tennis & gold cloths. After the pandemic, the world shifted to wear comfy cloths without any doubt that it could be seen as active wear. Therefore, the tennis skirt was one of the most coveted items by celebrities, putting the sport of tennis at the very top of sports influencing fashion.
With Golf, another traditional & considered rich sport made its way into the everyday wear fashion style. Many people started to wear the typical Golf style, when brands like Lacoste & Ralph Lauren created a lasting fashion trend using pastel colors & polo shirts while brands like Nike took a leap on Golf footwear by introducing well known sportswear items such as the Air Max 1 or Jordan Retro to the sport that many consumers, mainly the younger generations felt in love with and wanted to get their hands on.
The Trainers Trend
It was again Tennis that started the trend for sneakers to make it to the streets. In the 1970s, Adidas first presented the Stan Smith tennis shoe. A shoe that generated hype over decades & became an icon that is not just worn by almost every generation every day, also its style has been adopted by brands like Marc Jacobs.
However, it is the running shoe rather than the tennis shoe that has & is dominating high fashion, with high performance shoes commanding prices in the thousands of dollars. The spotlight was first directed to the running shoe with the help of Run-DMC who wore Adidas Superstars wherever they went. This is the moment, from where sports, music & fashion converged to create a powerful, lasting movement that is engaging generations.
But not only traditional sportswear brands such as Adidas or Nike playing a role in the sneakers culture, in the last 20 years high-end sneakers became part of the streetwear & denim culture. Top designers like Gucci, Virgil Abloh have embraced the style as a crucial wardrobe essential in their collections season over season. And there is no limit, when it comes to pushing design & material boundaries and to create bespoke collaborations such Nike’s Sacai or Of White collabs that every consumer is graving for.
On & off the Pitch
When we talk about sport’s influence on fashion, we cannot ignore the influence football has. Footballers & fans always had an affinity for fashion & still have, this is nothing new, but the appreciation is finally going the other way around. Today, we are entering an era where the fashion industry is embracing the influence of the game we all love. But this trend goes back to the 1970s where English football fans started to develop an individual style. In Liverpool teenagers went watching Liverpool at Anfield Road wearing Adidas suede trainers, the Samba, Mamba & Bamba kicks. At the same time it was important to wear the right shirt to show tribalism & pride, something the fashion industry didn’t want to be part of. However, big sporting brands started to position the team jersey & collection as fashion items that you can wear everyday to demonstrate your commitment & love for the club while looking stylish. One of the first collections that every young consumer wanted to get a piece of, was Nike’s Naja Collection 2018. A collection, where Nike set new standards for jersey design & culture - the jersey culture. The more unique & unknown as well as crazy from a design stand point, the better to make a statement.
Today, you see players like Jack Grealish as brand ambassadors for Gucci and the likes. It feels like the next logical step, from football jersey’s & boots on the catwalk to football players becoming faces of big fashion brands. The influence the global game has on fashion seems to be unlimited & will create new spaces to express your style.
Gymnastics as Fashion It Piece
In the 1980s the gymnast dress with its warm stockings, colored tights & bandanas made its way into fashion as women now wore it to go out for dancing. In this ways, women went from high heels to tennis shoes with stockings over their leggings, bandanas over their heads & wide shirts with belts like they were going for an aerobic class. this all started with icons like Cindy Lauper or Madonna. These divas would like to popular wear such items in their music videos.
Today the legging is one of the most common fashion items. there is no fashion brand that has not at least one legging in their seasonal collection & women wear it with all kinds of shoes, from the more traditional way with sneakers to the more high fashion attitude with heels. the legging is a style icon that you can wear with almost everything everyday while feeling comfortable.
Maria Markevich / Shutterstock
SUMMARY
Yes, there are many more sports that created an trend in fashion. just think about Basektball & the trend of college jackets, high top sneakers or simply the muscle shirts, a style that was common in 1990s, or how the Yoga pant influenced some more baggy pant styles in women’s fashion, or the tracksuit revolution that was powered by Bruce Lee, a famous MMA artist who wore tracksuits beyond the boarders of a gym. And there are more, and there will be even more in the future.
Sports & fashion are becoming more & more connected with sportswear building a place in the design industry. People are used to wear active wear as a part of daily fashion outfits. Leggings go easy with heels, and yoga pants are now common at work as a trend item. The global market is beginning to attend to a different type of consumer that expresses a modern lifestyle, an edgy attitude & new mindset. This combination of sports & fashion is more than a trend & represents a change in cultural ideals. Therefore, it is considered athleisure. Even if many fashion trends come & go, athleisure has come to stay and we will see much more sportswear on the catwalks for many years.