Make way for skateboarding: the fashion is now in tennis

It’s 2020, and skateboarding is everywhere. From the sneakers on our feet to the sweatshirts on our backs, the skate industry’s laid-back attitude has gripped the fashion industry for the past decade, whether that’s from Louis Vuitton’s embrace of skate culture , Gucci x Palace collaborations , and more. But in 2024, it looks like fashion has found a new sport to emulate: tennis.

Why did fashion have a thing for skateboarding?

From MSCHF sneakers designed to be shredded at the skate park to Palace Skateboards collaborating with high fashion brands, the fashion world’s obsession with skate culture has been unparalleled in recent years. While other sports such as football, basketball and even baseball have often threatened to become a new fan favourite, evidenced by the footy-themed drops from the likes of Wales Bonner and Acne Studios or Nike’s endless range of BB-inspired trainers, the skate culture takes hold And Low fashion has not lost its popularity for about ten years now.

Since the 2010s, skateboard brands such as Stüssy, Supreme and Palace have successfully entered the fashion world through collaborations with high fashion brands. Louis Vuitton joined Supreme in 2017; Palace Skateboards joined Gucci in 2022; and Virgil Abloh even made skater and creative Lucien Clarke the very first LV-sponsored skater in 2020. So you can bet that the relationship between skate and fashion was serious.

When did fashion get a taste for tennis?

The third wheel that nestles itself in the relationship between fashion and skateboarding was revealed earlier this year, and while we don’t want to place blame everything on that of Luca Guadagnino Challengers film, it seems to have been a catalyst for the industry’s new tennis obsession. Since Challengers dropped, signed On Zendaya (the film’s lead) to a multi-year partnership promoted by an extremely tennis-heavy campaign; Gucci has released a new Gucci Tennis collection with a campaign starring tennis players George Loffhagen and Emma Cohen; and even Palace Skateboards has switched sides in its latest campaign, a collaboration with Stella Artois that focused on hitting the tennis court for a cold.

We have to accept that Challengers can’t take all the credits do. Even before this year, many high fashion brands had already taken note of the tennis world. In 2022, Louis Vuitton signed Spanish tennis player Carlos Alcaraz as its house ambassador, before including him in the SS24 formalwear campaign. And in 2023, at the US Open, Italian player and Gucci ambassador Jannik Sinner wore a Gucci monogram duffel bag on court. Tennis has slowly but surely entered high fashion, and it’s finally here in full force.

Can tennis beat skate culture?

There are plenty of reasons why fashion has such a long-standing relationship with skate culture. For one, skateboarding is a subculture that’s seen as laid-back, rebellious, and anti-status quo; simply put, skateboarders are cool. As Brendon Babenzien, former Creative Director of Supreme, once said, “Skaters are awesome, smart, creative, and people want a piece of what they’ve got. It’s that simple.” What’s more, the style associated with skate culture is also a pretty easy aesthetic to appropriate. It’s often unbranded and vintage or archival, so it can be transformed however brands see fit.

Tennis, on the other hand, has a much more refined reputation. The aesthetic is curated, branded and extremely specific, largely because tennis courts have uniform rules even today. Tennis as a clothing style may be older than modern skate culture, but it is also more restrictive and difficult to create your own clothing style. Whether or not 2024 marks the first year of the tennis decade within the fashion industry, we’re still waiting to find out… something tells us this trend will burn bright and fast, though.

Main image via Palacand Skateboards x adidas©

More about Culted

See: How Marc Jacobs Saved Louis Vuitton From Boring

See: Ram x Mia Khalifa x Juergen Teller, what more could you want?