Courting Fashion

As the game continued to grow professionally and financially, clothing manufacturers increasingly scooped up tennis stars to be the faces of their brands, signing multi-million dollar contracts to place their logos prominently on the clothes of the top players.

Stan Smith inked one of the earliest deals with Adidas, with an eponymous tennis shoe design which endures to this day. In fact, his name is now commonly associated with the product above his tennis career, leading to his 2018 book titled Some People Think I’m a Shoe.

Björn Borg was signed by Fila, and the pinstriped shirt they outfitted him with at Wimbledon has stood as one of the most iconic looks in the history of the sport. 

Still, there were occasionally homemade touches. 15-year-old Tracy Austin made her US Open debut in a girlish pinafore dress made by a family friend.

As Tinling's influence waned in the mid-1980s, women's tennis clothing veered more conservative and standardized, losing the individuality and creativity expressed in the preceding decades, only to be reinvigorated by a wave of flashy young players in the late 1990s.

Now major sportswear companies compete to make the most eye-grabbing outfits that would be featured in media around the world. For champions like Venus and Serena Williams, their opening round matches at major events offered more intrigue for what new creation they would wear than their routine victories. Whether it was Serena’s “Catsuit” at the 2002 US Open or Venus’ lingerie-inspired look at the 2010 French Open, the sisters, as well as other players, put their own personality into their on-court fashion choices.

Further innovations in technology throughout the Open Era increased player comfort and performance. Scientists continued to develop synthetic, lightweight fabrics, which wicked away moisture and kept players from being bogged down in hot and humid conditions. When Ivan Lendl signed with Mizuno in 1989, he began sporting a hat with neck protection, referred to as a Legionnaires Hat. Though some critics thought it comical, it helped him tolerate the intense heat at the 1990 Australian Open to earn his 8th and last major singles title.

Still, fashion mattered just as much as function, if not more. Occasionally, corporate clothiers worked with fashion designers from outside the sportswear sphere. British designer Stella McCartney paired with Adidas to outfit several top women's players in feminine styles that used subtle neutral and pastel tones. In 2003, Belgian-American Diane Von Furstenberg collaborated with Reebok to create a Wimbledon dress for Venus Williams, which featured elegant lacing in the back, alluding to the corsets players had endured more than a century before.

Male players also were expected to make fashion statements on court. When he played his final tournament at the 2012 US Open, Andy Roddick wore a pair of star-spangled and striped Babolat shoes. Roger Federer often accessorized before and after matches, wearing cardigan sweaters, blazers, and trousers before matches in homage to the styles of 50 years earlier. Other looks were entirely new. Early in his career, Rafael Nadal paired sleeveless shirts with shorts that extended beyond his knees, nicknamed "piratas" for their length and his swashbuckling game