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Fashion attention may be focused on Paris, where the European men's wear collections have drawn to a close and the couture began Sunday evening with Versace's parade of gym-inspired glamazons. But in a different hemisphere, an equally eye-catching show has been taking place, which is worth pausing to consider for a moment.
I am speaking, of course, of the Australian Open, the tennis tournament that kicks off the Grand Slam quartet. If the ready-to-wear calendar is divided into four seasons — spring/summer, pre -fall, autumn/winter and cruise — the Slam tournaments fulfill almost the same function for sports wear (i.e., the stuff you wear to play sports; as opposed to sportswear, the system of separates attributed to the American fashion industry). Which means the Australian Open is also the opening style salvo of the year. It sets the tone for season one.
Though this might seem irrelevant to those with their eyes trained on the couture ateliers in France, what elite athletes wear on the court has a trickle-down effect on that increasingly important clothing genre known as "athleisure," which has an impact on what everyone wears.
The sports stuff gets put into the melting pot along with the haute stuff and the street stuff, and out comes the stuff of your wardrobe. Which means that, just as what happens on the runways over the next three days of couture matters, the trends being unveiled at the Australian Open in Melbourne matter. And they are?
Color. Also, geometric prints and s ome sheer. But mostly: color. The kind of saturated, sunset color most often associated with tropical drinks, as opposed to tennis.
Serena Williams kicked the whole thing off with her neon-yellow Nike crop top and skirt, not necessarily the best look for her (she resembled a bionic parakeet), but one that gave new dimension to what is shaping up to be the shade of month, also modeled by Jelena Jankovic (a hibiscus yellow), Novak Djokovic (a sunshine-y Uniqlo shirt) and Marin Cilic (lemon Li-Ning polo).
Then there was Maria Sharapova's peach-melba Nike halter dress with sheer mesh insert in back; Kei Nishikori's Uniqlo tangerine dream; Caroline Wozniacki's sunset-toned Stella McCartney for Adidas; Ana Ivanovic's cherry/rose/coral g raphic Bauhaus-inspired Adidas; and Agnieszka Radwanska's fluoro pink Lotto number.
Hot pink also showed up on Timea Bacsinszky and Carla Suárez Navarro. As it happens, Ms. Radwanska is playing Ms. Navarro in the quarterfinals on Tuesday, which could give new meaning to the idea of a "match," so it will be interesting to see if one of them opts for a different shade.
As to why the fruity palette, well, it could have something to do with beachy Australian inspirations; an effort to celebrate color before getting locked into the all-white situation at Wimbledon; the desire to start the year with energy; or, as The Age, a Melbourne newspaper, posited, "attempting to psych-out their competitors."
Whatever the reason, however, the upside of the trend was demonstrated by Stanislas Wawrinka, with his two-tone Tequila Sunrise of a matching shirt and shorts combo, fire opal orange melting into yellow fading back into orange. It left last year's nerd-chic look in the shade. We'll toast to that.
And we'll see if any of it shows up on the catwalks.
