Hi everyone, welcome back to SportsVerse, my twice-weekly newsletter that tells stories you can’t find anywhere else about the intersection of sports, fashion, business, and culture.
Given how intertwined the sports and fashion industries have become, we keep finding ourselves saying sentences that have never been said before. For example, Liverpool forward Hugo Ekitike sat next to Anna Wintour at Balenciaga’s Paris Fashion Week show on Saturday night, just three days before he played (and lost) in a Champions League game away at Galatasaray.
It’s easy to read the above and think, ‘so what?’ But it’s actually a situation that speaks volumes about 1) how valuable the next generation of footballing stars is to the fashion industry; 2) Balenciaga’s desire to be associated with sporting stardom in its new era; 3) changing fan/societal attitudes to footballers participating in fashion week during the season; 4) Liverpool’s ambitions to become football’s most fashionable team.
I’ll break it down for you.
These days, it’s no longer a novelty for footballers to pop up at Paris Fashion Week, but it’s far less common to see one sitting front row, cosying up to none other than Anna Wintour, as Ekitike found himself doing at the Balenciaga show on Saturday.
Seating arrangements at fashion shows are not thrown together just anyhow. Brand teams and agencies pore over each and every spot for hours, with changes often occurring all through the night before the show. It was the perfect indication of Balenciaga’s desire to promote its push into sports culture while reasserting its credibility as a luxury powerhouse under creative director Pierpaolo Piccioli. (You can read more about Balenciaga’s new sports strategy in my article below.)
It’s also a sign of how much attitudes have changed in recent years towards footballers expressing an interest in and participating in fashion week events during the season. Hector Bellerin was ridiculed for walking in a Louis Vuitton show during his Arsenal days, while his former teammate and Bayern Munich player Serge Gnabry was criticised by fans, the media and even his own coach when he took a trip on an off day to attend a Paris Fashion Week show just a couple of years ago. But this time, with Ekitike at fashion week mere days before a crucial Champions League tie, no one batted an eyelid.
That Anna Wintour was keen to be seated next to the Liverpool player also reflects how important the next generation of sports stars is viewed by the fashion establishment, too. If you’re thinking it’s a coincidence that Wintour was seated next to the Liverpool player, think again. A brand would not risk the ire of Wintour by seating her next to someone she wouldn’t want to be photographed with (save for a few mishaps in years gone by). Ekitike and Wintour even posed for a cute photo together.
The fact that Ekitike was allowed to travel to fashion week ahead of the Champions League tie on Tuesday night could speak to Liverpool’s wider ambitions to be seen as a team immersed in the fashion industry.
The title of football’s most fashionable club has changed hands among a select few over the years. PSG held the crown for several years thanks to its relationship with brands like Dior, Jordan and 3.Paradis.
Arsenal, long known for its iconic kits and overall club aesthetic, has stepped things up considerably in recent years with a relentless strategy to align itself with the fashion industry, featuring collaborations with streetwear labels like Aries and A Cold Wall, and relying on Adidas to unlock culturally significant partnerships such as that with London-based Labrum, which designed the team’s away kit last season and hosted a fashion week show at the Emirates Stadium.
Other smaller teams, like Venezia, Red Star FC and Athens Kallithea have all played their role in innovating football’s relationship with fashion, hiring creative directors and other fashion industry insiders as consultants, and supporting new kit launches with lookbook-style imagery.
But more recently, Liverpool has emerged as the latest team making a strategic pivot towards fashion.
Look no further than the deal with Tommy Hilfiger, the club’s fashion partner since the start of the season, which has revolutionised the concept of the pre-game tunnel walk in the Premier League, where it has never been a thing until recently. It has allowed the club to further position many of its players, such as Dominik Szoboszlai (above) and Ekitike, as style influencers in their own right.
It’s currently an edge that Liverpool has over the rest of the competition in the Premier League. I’m sure it won’t be long before others jump on the bandwagon.
That’s all for today, friends. Thanks for coming along for the ride.
See you next time,
DYM