FASHION FIX: The problem with adidas as told through Ana's Grand Slam dresses
Picture this: You're the world's top-ranked lady baller and current French Open champion who's been featured on the cover of countless magazine covers, billboards and newspapers. Your big sponsor, adidas, dressed you up in tired gear for your big win in Paris this month but no hard feelings, right? All you want is a originally designed, inspired and functional dress to wear for the final Grand Slams of the year and here's what they give you:The Wimbledon dress (above), in the required white with lilac piping around the neckline and arm holes, was supposedly inspired by flower petals but I'm thinking someone was eating lady fingers when they came up with the design. And for the US Open you're sporting the same dress but in some drab grey-brown moment (below). *Yawn* Even the proportions, most noticeably the length of the dress, seem awkward on you.
Anway Ana, you might want to think about getting yourself involved in the design of next year's dresses. How about something like adidas by ana, ana for adidas, or a partnership like Maria "not even close to top-10" Kirilenko and Stella McCartney have with the brand? Oh, and instead of annoyed bloggers (like me!) writing open letters to your sponsor you might want to let them in on their lackadaisical design efforts for one of tennis' top stars.
It's your image, that's all.
*Via Down the Line!
(images via adidas, anaivanovic.com)
Comment
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Comment by OneLuv (JC for short) on June 16, 2008 at 1:02pm
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No comment... your reply say's it all.
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Comment by tennis baller on June 16, 2008 at 12:50pm
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I have to disagree. Maybe in the past it fashion and image didn't matter much but we live in a marketing/image driven world so how the ballers look matters not only to the bottom line of the companies but for their wallets as well.
I doubt Nike would ever ask him to change his style because it's HIS style and it's an individual sport where personality matters - that's PR 101. I used to work in publicity so I really understand the nuances involved in working a person's image.
Look, playing up baller's personalities has been going on in tennis forever - do you think the greatest rivalries happened only because of the game ballers bring to the court? Personality plays a huge part in it and makes it even more compelling - Evert vs. Navratilova, McEnroe vs. Borg, Agassi vs. Sampras. Their matches were so intense because of different energy each baller brought to the court.
And, at the end of the day fashion is fun and tennis is supposed to be fun, but I think fans and people in the sport take it too seriously as if they're trying to protect it. In most other sports there's a sense of fun, personality, celebrity, tongue and cheek, etc. Tennis could use a little more of it.
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It's great that fans are so into fashion but at the end of the day who really cares? The game will always be bigger than the individual and some players just need to realize that. I remember when they made such a big fuss back in the days as to how Agassi was going to show up at Wimbeldon knowing fully that his rebel"esque" style with the Nike flashy colors splattered all over will not fit well with the strict traditional Wimbeldon white. After the whole fiasco ended Agassi showed up in the traditional whites and Nike got their publicity. Players go out there to play the game and believe it or not they have as much say as to what they are going to wear and how it appears just as much as their sponsors do. This is why we see Nadal still wearing his cut off sleeves and 3/4 shorts and as much as I admire the player there is no way you'll ever see me sporting that anytime soon. How many times do you think Nike has approached Nadal into changing his fashion just so they can sell more clothes?
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