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Artist Sagg Napoli kicked off Dior’s Spring/Summer 2025 show by striding onto the runway wielding a bow. Assuming position in a glass case, she then began firing arrows continuously at a bullseye, while models wearing motorcycle jackets and bodysuits circled around her.
This striking display of archery underscored fashion’s latest fascination: athletic disciplines that fall outside the mainstream. In London this season, we saw boxing-inspired designs at Yuhan Wang, figure skating motifs from Ashley Williams, and rhythmic gymnastics silhouettes at Chopova Lowena. Milan had its moment too, with ballet influencing Ferragamo’s collection.
The resurgence of athletic influences in fashion isn’t entirely new — sportswear has had its hold on the industry for decades, from streetwear to luxury athleisure. The popularity of football-inspired styles, particularly the “blokecore” trend, which drew from a nostalgia for ’90s football culture, has also shown how deeply sports silhouettes resonate with consumers in 2024. What is new is that niche, underrepresented sports — like archery, figure skating and rhythmic gymnastics — are now coming to the fore of fashion’s interest. It reflects a deeper cultural shift.
“We saw the Summer Olympics in Paris create the perfect intersection for fashion and sport to connect and now more luxury labels than ever are tapping into niche sports for new sources of inspiration,” says Krista Corrigan, retail analyst at Edited. With non-conventional Olympic sports like surfing, pistol shooting, BMXing and skateboarding drawing the most attention online, it’s no surprise designers are looking further afield.
“There was a lot of fashion inspiration and fodder at the Olympics if you were looking for it. From Ray Gunn’s tracksuit (I liked it! Am I the only one?) to the fencing garb and shooting uniforms,” says fashion journalist and Newsfash host Mosha Lundström, who believes we’re going to continue to see more less-obvious sports codes incorporated into collections.
It’s especially important as silhouettes like football shirts and biker shorts hit saturation. “Traditional athleisure silhouettes will remain important but as sport continues its influence in fashion, brands need to find fresh interpretations to connect with consumers,” says Corrigan.
“Micro-trends, in their ever velocitous cycling, rely on the reimagining of niche aesthetics,” agrees Shaun Singh, CEO and founder of stock media library Death to Stock (DTS). He notes that this year we have already seen the Zendaya-fronted film Challengers trend set tenniscore, while balletcore has been an enduring aesthetic on TikTok since January, with over 80,000 posts on TikTok under the hashtag. Now it appears we’re going further outside the traditional realms of sports.
But are all these references just fleeting microtrends? Or does the influx of sports inspiration into fashion represent a more long-term convergence, underscored by changing attitudes? Just like the rise of corpcore and bridalcore last year — two trends that redefined corporate wear and wedding attire — reflected changing cultural attitudes towards work and marriage, experts believe sports aesthetics are the latest style to be supercharged by a sociological shift.
Changing attitudes towards sports
For Singh, the rising influence of niche sportswear in fashion ties directly to a trend DTS reported on earlier this year, “Sports Social”. It found one of the most significant transformations in 2024 has been the way society views sports, with a stronger emphasis on community, wellness and enjoyment rather than competition alone, and that sports have now become a primary mode of socialisation in an increasingly fragmented world. “It’s no surprise that sports culture is being excavated for its most underrepresented elements of style,” he says.
“Sport has become a culturally aspirational identity marker,” says Holly Gilbertson, managing director at Pacer, highlighting how people use sports to anchor themselves in today’s turbulent world. “Whether it’s fangirling F1, entering a runner girl era or going full Pilates princess, sport and identity expression have collided in so many diverse, different ways.”
This year, designers have also challenged traditional gender norms in sports fashion. Sasha Mills, integrated creative at Pacer, observes: “For example, Yuhan Wang’s ultra-femme ‘coquette-core’ style was combined with the visual world of boxing, a sport traditionally coded as masculine. It’s a clear subversion of those conventions, reflecting how perceptions of sport and gender have shifted.”
The expansive approach to gender in sports fashion can also be seen in the rise of the ‘blokette’ trend and the increasing number of women adopting traditionally masculine aesthetics, such as gorpcore. This cross-pollination of gendered fashion codes represents a broader cultural shift towards inclusivity in sports and beyond. “Fashion has always been an identity game, and sport’s gender-expansive evolution has made it an expressive playground for experimentation,” adds Gilbertson. She believes we’ll continue to see fashion houses take this expansive approach to athleisure: focusing on how they can continue to subvert the heritage of sports in new, more inclusive ways.
Will this new trend run off track?
The influence of niche sports in fashion is poised to be more than a fleeting runway moment. As sports become even more embedded in community life, fashion’s exploration of these themes is likely to continue evolving. Corrigan points out that niche sports are already making their mark on street style and retail, with rugby shirts gaining traction at Abercrombie Fitch and Gap, and hockey-inspired tops surfacing at labels like AWGE and Wooyoungmi.
Consumer demand is backing this shift. On platforms like Depop, searches for sports-related clothing are surging: jersey searches are up 96 per cent from May to June 2024, basketball shorts have jumped 124 per cent since the start of the year, and tennis shorts have seen a 22 per cent increase since July. These numbers reflect not just a fashion moment, but a growing appetite for athletic aesthetics in everyday wardrobes.
Moreover, high-profile collaborations between luxury brands and sportswear giants — such as Nike x Jacquemus and Adidas x Gucci — have already been enthusiastically received by consumers, proving the trend’s staying power. Athlete-led campaigns are also here to say, according to Corrigan.
For Singh, the future of sportswear may lie in its ability to blend modernised tailoring with unexpected pairings. “After watching Olympic shooter Kim Yeji, we wouldn’t be surprised to see cyborg-like eyewear paired with backwards hats take over streetwear,” he says.
The key to the trend’s longevity may be its ability to adapt and merge athletic functionality with diverse fashion elements. For Lundström, it all comes down to the “fluidity of the modern wardrobe”, where “leotards, leather, and lace all coexist. Ballet flats and track pants. Sneakers and tulle. Stilettos and a sweatshirt. These are all perfectly acceptable and frankly fun combos these days.”
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