“It’s always been both: basketball and fashion,” says WNBA star—and emerging fashion icon—Angel Reese in a Versace dress. Photographed by Norman Jean Roy. Styled by Julia Sarr-Jamois. Vogue, Winter 2025.
when it started, but I can tell you when I knew: The Olympics were winding down, I was watching rhythmic gymnastics, and it struck me with a pang that in a matter of days there would be no more of this, this pageant of human effort and excellence. No more synchronized diving. No more twirling shot-putters or pole-vaulters flying backward through the air. Farewell to the impassive, agile grapplers, and to the whiplash pleasure of a badminton rally. Or—wait—I interrupted myself. Tennis! Tennis has rallies! How many days until the US Open? Could I make it until then?
I guess everyone’s been sports-pilled. Because, wow, the Open was a scene—Taylor Swift, Kendall Jenner, movie stars, and influencers everywhere. Maybe they’d all gotten really into Challengers. Or maybe this was part and parcel of a turn in the zeitgeist, which is what I suspect. Because around the same time, the spring 2025 fashion season was underway, and it was like you couldn’t throw a stone without hitting a sports star. Gymnasts, sprinters, basketball players, footballers, boxers perching their muscular butts on seats at Michael Kors, Tommy Hilfiger, Carolina Herrera, Burberry, Bottega Veneta. And more. I even spotted dapper fencer Miles Chamley-Watson at Fendi. So this isn’t just about tennis. But—returning for a moment to the US Open—consider the destiny of the two men who played the final. Not long after concluding their showdown at Arthur Ashe, both flew to Milan, where Jannik Sinner sat front row at Gucci, and Taylor Fritz walked the runway at Boss. Meanwhile, up in the stands, Taylor Swift was watching that Fritz-Sinner match with her NFL-star boyfriend Travis Kelce and his Kansas City Chiefs teammate Patrick Mahomes, who’d turned up camera-ready in, respectively, Gucci and Prada.
“If I’m in the city during Fashion Week, I’m not not going,” declares top-ranked player Frances Tiafoe, who, straight after dazzling Open-goers, made a beeline for IB Kamara’s Off-White show. It was held on a basketball court. Women’s US Open champ Aryna Sabalenka and Olympic gymnast Suni Lee were there too.
Reese begins her sophomore season with the Chicago Sky in May. Stella McCartney dress. Femme La shoes. Fashion Editor: Julia Sarr-Jamois.
I reel off this very non- comprehensive list of recent sports-fashion mash-ups because, bluntly, as trends go, it’s weird. Since time immemorial, there has been Sport, and there has been Fashion. At an apparel level, the two do habitually converse—Coco Chanel launched her business making tennis dresses, and today’s athleisure has antecedents in Claire McCardell’s bodysuits and Y2K-era Prada Sport. They call it “sportswear” for a reason. And it is likewise true that there have always been individual athletes with loads of style. But as cultures, as worlds, the runway and the stadium kept their distance, with rare exceptions (David Beckham, the Williams sisters) proving the rule. Now the stadium isthe runway: The “tunnel ’fit,” the pregame looks athletes wear ambling from team bus to locker room, has turned NFL and NBA players into tastemakers, with stylists pulling items straight from Paris shows and millions following fan accounts like @leaguefits.