The 2008 European Football Championship finally kicked off yesterday. Yes, I know, there are probably too many people out there who think that football is not a strictly fashion-related subject. Yet I do think the connections between fashion, style and sport (and football in particular), are manifold.
Think about the transformations sport uniforms went through in the last few years: tennis attire has dramatically changed, becoming more colourful but also more subtle, glamorous and sexy. In the same way, football uniforms have evolved, changing on a regular basis, in accordance with the sponsors' desires and the latest trends.
The Italian national team or, “la Nazionale”, as we call it, first played in a white football strip for a very simple reason: white shirts were cheaper than coloured ones. Pale blue was then chosen as this was the colour of the Savoia's family escutcheon, but, up until the ‘70s, the uniforms maintained a rather traditional style.
As technical sponsors were brought in and as the team entered the ‘80s, the uniforms started changing: at the 1982 World Cup the traditional round neck strips was swapped in favour of a V-neck shirt with tricoloured details. One of the most unfortunate choices remains instead the 1996-1998 Nike uniform with "Italia" printed more or less on the buttocks of the players.
The Kappa "Kombat" model, with a fitted cut and in a stretching fabric became "It" strip at the 2000 European Championships and gold letters substituted the more traditional white ones at the 2002 World Cup.
When in 2006 Puma became the team’s technical sponsor, the new strips changed again: the new sponsor favoured a return to old-style fabrics, but played in a stylish way with the classic colours and styles. The Euro 2008 home “maglia azzurra” now sports golden details, while the away strip in white is characterised by a tricoloured triangle peeking around the neckline. A fourth star has also been added over the FIGC (Italian Football Federation) tricolour logo to symbolise the four world titles won by the team. Up until 2000, an agreement between the FIGC and the
technical sponsors stated the sponsors could not put on the strips their
own trademarks and logos, this meant that the Italian shirts were for decades rather minimalist and simple. Unfortunately this sort of "ban" was lifted 8 years ago, so the new strips sport also the technical sponsor's logo.
The changes in the cut and colours of football strips is just the top of the iceberg. The projects between fashion and sport have multiplied throughout the years and now there are football teams asking designers to do special collections for them. At their Champions League Final against Man Utd in Moscow, Chelsea sported an off-field Armani wardrobe that featured a single-breasted, two-button, navy blue suit in lightweight wool gaberdine, a pale blue cotton shirt, a tie, dark brown belt and suede half-boots, a navy cashmere overcoat and a nylon rain-mac. The Nazionale players instead wear Puma on the pitch and Dolce & Gabbana off the pitch. The Italian duo also designed the official uniforms of the Chinese Olympic National team.
If you want to explore further the connection between fashion and football, check out the "11 Meter Mode" project: a few months ago, 11 Austrian and Swiss designers were called to take part in this event and to create outfits inspired by Euro 2008. The name of the event refers to the distance that separates the penalty mark - that is the point where the penalty kicks are taken - from the goal.
The designers involved in the project have successfully managed to turn sportswear into stylish-wear: ChainReaction's Berenika Rührnössel and Aslihan Atayol created a dress that evokes Paco Rabanne’s chain mail ’60s dresses using 1,000 beer bottle caps - each cap bearing the colours of one of the nations taking part in the tournament. The dress is supposed to symbolise that strange chemistry between men, football and beer.
Precise geometrical lines characterise Michael Eisner's cape-cum-flag and Ulrike Kogelmüller's "EUrban Player" outfit, a mini-dress in the colours of the Austrian flag that somehow managed to evoke YSL’s Mondrian dress.
Referees also turned into inspirational figures for these young designers: Nicotin's
Aerni Nicolas went for a post-modern interpretation of the classic referee uniform that calls to mind André Courrèges' 1965 S/S collection, while Gina Drewes opted for a haute couture approach to the referee outfit.
Haute couture seemed to be also the inspiration behind the fierce looking evening gown that fuses the colours of the Swiss flag with the green of the football pitch created by DIEL Style.
Designer duo Bipone, that is Bilyana Pelova and Petar Pelov, created instead a romantically sweet Little Red Riding Hood-meets-ballerina-meets-football player dress, while Sagenhaft mixed all the "ingredients" of football – ball, goal net, striped socks - with a good dose of fetishism. The result is an ideal dress for the modern football dominatrix hiding in every woman.
If you're still convinced that football is utterly un-stylish, I can only suggest you to watch at least one match from the 2008 Euro Championships: you'll soon realise that there's often more grace in a talented football player's movements than in a model strutting on a catwalk.
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