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Michael Jordan had already climaxed on the fashion front before his Herculean moment in 1988 when he flew mid-air like a virile beast to dunk a ball. In 1985, The Jumpman struck a deal of mega proportions with Nike, making every collaboration from then to now look mediocre. Forget the money you splash out on a pair of salacious Air Jordans; the former basketball player takes home five per cent royalty on every single purchase. This does not count every other product sitting in the Air Jordan universe. Yet, nothing beats the legend wearing his own brand. The first-ever pair was crafted for the Chicago Bulls star a year before the world got a taste of the good stuff. That's how the story started.A red and black colourway of the Nike Air Ship set the benchmark for hype-worthy high tops. Off-court, Jordan didn't fare too badly either. You don't swag around in an oversized trench coat or colour-splattered co-ords if you don't have cojones the size of the balls you're shooting. In Philadelphia, a puny six-foot-tall (a short guy in a league dominated by giants) Allen Iverson—who'd roll out of bed after knocking back gallons of tequila and 18 minutes of sleep, dropping 48 on the court—was hitting strip clubs in baggy sweats and enough bling to make you blind, exuding a hip-hop vibe long before Ye could pronounce Bal-enc-iaga. Biggie Smalls and Tupac were his only contenders.
This was the early '90s. A time when dressing up in cool fashion wasn't for the camera lenses of hungry paparazzi or the voyeuristic eyes of a million Instagram followers. Yet, basketball players were defining how regular folk presented themselves, especially in smaller neighbourhoods. Sure, tailoring was significant, but it was limited to an elite class: premier Indian statesmen, hungry Wall Street money makers, primo lawyers and charismatic Hollywood characters. Funk meant oversized wares. A neck chain and signet rings were the marks of cool fashion Hall of Famers. Bandanas and caps were more critical than your hairstyle. Basketball set the tone for what we now call street style and athleisure.
In India, a niche audience had begun sporting NBA jerseys with 23 (Jordan's iconic jersey number) stamped on the back and shorts hitting their knees. Look around, and you'll realise that we're wearing the same gear while walking about. Designers across the globe are only indulging us.
Powerhouse fashion brands inject sport into everything from haute couture to blowout ready-to-wear collections. For instance, when Kim Jones was the men's artistic director of Louis Vuitton in 2011. He flipped the idea of what luxury clothing could be, changing the metric from stiff and uptight to slick and wearable. Now at Dior, he's normalised the hybridisation of tailoring and sport. "Look at Air Jordans, from a basketball shoe to what it is now. It's super iconic, but when Kim Jones teamed up with Brand Jordan for the Dior x Air Jordan 1, it was the ultimate superstar collaboration. It was massively impactful and is still selling at a crazy price in the resale market. There's been nothing like it. It's a testimony of a luxury house paying homage to the sport," says fashion consultant Edward Lalrempuia. "Brands are borrowing from each other, and sportswear has always been a key ingredient."
The late Virgil Abloh applied a similar algorithm as the men's artistic director of Louis Vuitton. Besides having an army of ballplayers and rappers sitting in the front row at shows and Arsenal footballer Héctor Bellerín walking the ramp, Abloh rolled out punchy suits—the kind you'd see players wear in the outside world. Not to mention his role as the CEO of Off-White, where a track jacket and jogger co-ords were a copy-paste of an Iverson look. On the other hand, Hermès—the antithesis of in-your-face gear and an amalgamation of history, quality and culture—tackles louche dressing. Clothes you would wear to an equestrian or yachting event.A New Era
At every touchpoint, there lies one commonality. But we got a full-blown taste of it back in the noughties. That's really when things started heating up. Athletes were considered supreme beings. You wanted to be them. You wanted to look like them. Unlike mainstream celebrities who influenced select audiences, players impacted mass culture. Such was and is their power. David Beckham became a style icon and legendary footballer all at once. He made suits sizzle—cut slimmer and razor-sharp, appealing to men who'd never heard of Savile Row. He may as well have been cast as Bond if it wasn't for a questionable mohawk. Then came in the likes of Lewis Hamilton and Virat Kohli. All tatted up, they disrupted the good boy image of serious sport. Say what you want about the guy, but what would India be without Kohli?
He changed the way a nation perceived the gentleman's game. Aggressive and unrattled, he made cricket sexy. Until he hit the scene, the common man was reliant on '90s boy bands and Bollywood to dictate style choices, resulting in frumpy, filmy dressing and shockingly bad head-to-toe looks. Kohli didn't just shake up the game; he was batting a 100 in the style department. It explains why he's still the country's most valuable celebrity, and it has as much to do with fashion as it does his cricketing chops. Shikhar Dhawan, Hardik Pandya and KL Rahul only helped rev up the party. It would be weird not to see all of them decked out in solid brands—from Balenciaga and Prada to Dolce & Gabbana.
Today the currency of a sports star isn't just valued at how well they play on the field. It's far bigger. Mega endorsements hang on their personal styles—while entering or exiting a stadium, an airport look, an IG post. You're following their every move on a sporting ground as much as you are off it. Bollywood stars hang on their coattails and not the other way around (think Air Jordans and New Era caps). The question lies, who are you leaning towards right now, LeBron or Kohli? Hamilton or Hardik?
At every touchpoint, there lies one commonality. But we got a full-blown taste of it back in the noughties. That's really when things started heating up. Athletes were considered supreme beings. You wanted to be them. You wanted to look like them. Unlike mainstream celebrities who influenced select audiences, players impacted mass culture. Such was and is their power. David Beckham became a style icon and legendary footballer all at once. He made suits sizzle—cut slimmer and razor-sharp, appealing to men who'd never heard of Savile Row. He may as well have been cast as Bond if it wasn't for a questionable mohawk. Then came in the likes of Lewis Hamilton and Virat Kohli. All tatted up, they disrupted the good boy image of serious sport. Say what you want about the guy, but what would India be without Kohli?
He changed the way a nation perceived the gentleman's game. Aggressive and unrattled, he made cricket sexy. Until he hit the scene, the common man was reliant on '90s boy bands and Bollywood to dictate style choices, resulting in frumpy, filmy dressing and shockingly bad head-to-toe looks. Kohli didn't just shake up the game; he was batting a 100 in the style department. It explains why he's still the country's most valuable celebrity, and it has as much to do with fashion as it does his cricketing chops. Shikhar Dhawan, Hardik Pandya and KL Rahul only helped rev up the party. It would be weird not to see all of them decked out in solid brands—from Balenciaga and Prada to Dolce & Gabbana.
Today the currency of a sports star isn't just valued at how well they play on the field. It's far bigger. Mega endorsements hang on their personal styles—while entering or exiting a stadium, an airport look, an IG post. You're following their every move on a sporting ground as much as you are off it. Bollywood stars hang on their coattails and not the other way around (think Air Jordans and New Era caps). The question lies, who are you leaning towards right now, LeBron or Kohli? Hamilton or Hardik?