Naomi Osaka: The dedicated follower of fashion turning tennis courts into catwalks

In Australia, she wore a jellyfish-inspired outfit with a gigantic hat, a parasol, and a full-length veil. In Paris, she wore a sequinned gold dress that sparkled like the Eiffel Tower, underneath a black embroidered corset and a cascading maxi skirt. In London, she donned a long kimono inspired by the movie Kill Bill and her Japanese heritage.

With the US Open in full swing this week in New York, it was time for Naomi Osaka’s latest fashion moment, and she did not disappoint.

The former world No 1 and four-time Grand Slam champion paid tribute to Allen Iverson by wearing an outfit inspired by the NBA legend.

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Before the tournament started, Osaka wore a shirt with a photo of Iverson on it, which prompted reporters to ask her what the former Sixers guard meant to her.

“For me, he's a trailblazer. He's also someone that I look up to a lot, because he's done a lot in fashion, whether it's on purpose or not, but he's shifted the way that NBA players dress,” Osaka replied.

“I also think the whole conversation around clothes in sports and also just expressing yourself through style, I feel like he's someone that I look up to in that regard.”

Osaka's outfits – in pictures

Osaka has been using her passion for fashion as a form of self-expression. The 28-year-old is outspoken when it comes to topics that matter to her, but is generally reserved and quiet off the court.

The two ways in which she is at her loudest is when she’s pummeling a tennis ball or putting together a carefully curated outfit. One of the loudest statements she ever made came in the form of seven masks she wore during the 2020 US Open, each carrying the name of a black victim of racial violence.

She had the seven masks with her before the event even began and drew motivation from her mission to display a different name with every match she won. She went on to win seven matches that tournament to clinch the title and shed light on racial injustice in America.

Osaka’s recent fashion choices are not necessarily about making a statement, but they’re telling a story nonetheless – one she spends months and months putting together with standout designers from the fashion industry, along with the crew at sponsor Nike.

She shares her own sketches and often collaborates with Asian designers – like Robert Wun, Yoon Ahn, Hana Yagi – to bring her vision to life. Her latest project, showcased at this year’s US Open, was designed by NYC label Who Decides War and commissioned by fashion stylist Law Roach.

The nod to Iverson merges tennis, basketball and streetwear and pays tribute to his influence on the sports fashion industry.

Her elaborate walk-on curations are tennis’ answer to the now-famous NBA and WNBA tunnel looks, and she quickly discards the items of clothing to dress down into her match kit by the time the first ball his hit.

Osaka’s dramatic entrance for her opening round in New York this week has been one of the most-watched clips of the tournament on social media (the one from the official US Open Instagram account has nearly 700,000 views alone, and her post-match interview has 1.2 million views at the time of writing).

“I just get really nervous during the first round of this tournament because I want to do well and I want to show you guys some more outfits,” she told the Arthur Ashe Stadium night-session crowd after her close victory over Anastasia Zakharova.

As with many things Osaka does, her fashion choices are divisive. Some admire the theatrical element to her arrival, and l and look forward big reveal.

Andrea Petkovic was commentating Osaka’s Australian Open first-round match earlier this year and described the star’s outfit as “stunning”.

“I’m so glad that I was able to witness it because I am a little bit of a victim for fashion and this is of course right up my alley,” Petkovic added. “She had her bag already parked on her bench, had the umbrella, had the hat, the veil. If the outfit was white, I would have thought maybe she’s trying to get married. But no, it is absolutely stunning.”

Others have not been as flattering. Laura Siegemund, who lost to Osaka at this year’s French Open, told Eurosport Germany after the defeat: “I came here to play tennis, not to put on a fashion show. If other people want to do a fashion show, they can do that. It’s fine for me.”

The German said that her opponent’s walk-ons were “yet another example of big names being treated differently”, implying that Osaka was breaking the rules in some shape or form.

Veteran tennis writer Courtney Nguyen, who has closely covered Osaka since her early days on tour for outlets and organisations like Sports Illustrated, WTA and the BBC, believes Osaka’s daring creations bring a lot to the sport.

“It creates a different lane of relevance that tennis needs so desperately,” Nguyen told The National. “That’s why tennis has become what it has over the last 50 years; it’s because it's not just forehands and backhands. And it’s never been just forehands and backhands, and Naomi is the one that is continuing that tradition: that it's not just forehands and backhands; we can have whimsy, we can have fun.

“I mean, how many professional tennis players, Grand Slam champions, have said, 'I picked up a racquet because I wanted Serena's dress, because I wanted Venus's dress?' It's literally [why] Madison Keys [got into tennis].”

Indeed, Osaka is far from being the first player to push the envelope when it comes to tennis fashion. For more than 100 years, tennis and fashion have regularly intertwined, with many players, especially women, making bold statements through their outfits that proved to be seminal moments in the sport and key steps in the evolution of tennis attire.

In the 1920s, French player Suzanne Lenglen became a style icon well beyond the tennis court, thanks to her outfits created by haute couture designer Jean Patou.

Nicknamed "La Divine", Lenglen revolutionised tennis attire in that era by shortening her skirt to above-calf length – a big taboo at the time – and shunning the heavy corsets and bulky undergarments that restricted movement on court.

She also wrapped her head with a bandeau, which was the signature of roaring ‘20s fashion, during her matches, wore red lipstick, and painted her nails.

Lenglen’s radical choices were initially met with criticism and accusations of indecency before her style transcended sport and turned her into a global icon.

There are many other examples of historic fashion moments in tennis.

From Gussie Moran’s lace-trimmed knickers, Lea Pericoli’s shocking Schiaparelli-pink petticoat at Wimbledon in the 1940s and 50s, all the way to Andre Agassi’s denim shorts, Roger Federer’s Wimbledon blazer, and Serena Williams’ multiple catsuits and collaborations with the late Virgil Abloh, the tennis court has long been a place where fashion statements are made.

“It's a whole other way to engage with fans. And if it doesn't resonate with you, that's fine; sit and watch the tennis. It's OK. If it's not for you, it's not for you. It's not for everybody,” continued Nguyen.

“But I think that it is very, very close-minded to think that it [what Naomi is doing] isn't reaching a group of people that the sport needs to engage with, in order to be a global sport, that is understood, especially on the women's side, to make global icons.”

While she’s not the first – and won’t be the last – to experiment with fashion on court, Osaka certainly seems to be getting a great deal of negative reaction to her outfits, compared to other players in modern tennis history.

Serena Williams faced criticism when she wore a full-length bodysuit at the 2018 French Open because organisers deemed it against the rules. She later revealed it was medically necessary and provided compression that helped prevent blood clots.

Maria Sharapova was mocked relentlessly by fans when she wore a blue dress with a watercolour-print mesh overlay at the 2010 Australian Open.

Still, the visceral reaction by some to Osaka seems to be fuelled by bizarre anger that outweighs the few seconds in which she is actually wearing the walk-on outfit.

What is she doing that is so different from what we’ve seen in the past from the likes of Serena and Venus Williams, Sharapova, Federer or Agassi?

“What Naomi does that is different is that for the bulk of her career, since she became like an icon in women's sport, is that she's kind of on her own,” said Nguyen. “There's nobody else doing it right now.

“It used to be Serena Williams, Maria, Roger; I think those are kind of the three players that really sometimes they would wear things out on court and you're like, ‘That is too much, right?’ Or people just reacted very strongly to. Whether it was Federer's cardigan or Serena's Puma denim skirt, or Sharapova's Avatar dress from the Australian Open one year.

“There was always something that got people talking, but everybody at the time, during that era, understood that that was part of the tennis. No one sat there and said, ‘How dare you? Who do you think you are? Oh, you're just, you're just an attention seeker’. No one said that about Roger, really. Same with Maria.

“Now you aren't getting that [daring fashion statements] as much in this current era of women's tennis, and maybe it's starting to try to get back to it.

“Naomi is the only one trying anything. She's the only one going out there and taking a swing in the way that fashion is supposed to be taking a swing.”

Osaka said in her press conference this week that nothing she does is about making a statement, even if it somehow ends up being that way. She loves fashion, she loves storytelling through fashion and is motivated “to do things that create joy and happiness”.

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“I think that she is particularly built for it,” says Nguyen. “And her ownership over the creative aspect of specifically the walkout outfit; because I think that her dresses, yes, there is some conversation, but a lot of that is still very much Nike-driven in terms of the silhouettes and things like that. But in terms of the walkout, that's still very much her own thing. So she wants it.

“She wants to have that conversation. She knows why she's doing it. She's not concerned necessarily with this negativity.”

Tennis’ popularity has been on the rise – aided by the Zendaya movie Challengers, among other factors – and some of the biggest fashion houses are currently involved in tennis, like Gucci backing Jannik Sinner and Aryna Sabalenka, Louis Vuitton sponsoring Carlos Alcaraz, Bottega Venetta working with Lorenzo Musetti, Miu Miu collaborating with Coco Gauff and New Balance and Boss sponsoring Taylor Fritz and Matteo Berrettini.

But what Osaka is doing feels beyond all of that. Her heavy involvement in the creative process, her collaborations with different designers, and her ability to merge her heritage, her interests, and pop culture is getting the whole world talking, both positively and negatively.

Perhaps we’ll look back at this moment in time and realise just how pivotal it was in the history of sports fashion. “I literally do the things that I love to do, and I feel like people relate to it, and I'm really glad and grateful for that,” said Osaka this week.

Naomi Osaka: The dedicated follower of fashion turning tennis courts into catwalks

Japanese player's Grand Slam walkouts have become a major talking point, but she is just the latest in a long line of players to push boundaries with her outfits

Osaka's outfits – in pictures