Soccer Fashion

The Women's Professional Soccer league, or WPS, is the new top league in North America and begins play at the end of March. What to wear, what to wear?

Project Runway's Christian Siriano worked with Puma to produce designs for the seven teams, which were unveiled last week to mixed reviews.



The main complaint concerns an optional removable wrap that converts shorts to a skort, reminiscent of the skorts worn by the women ball players in A League of Their Own.

As the wrap is optional and not intended for field use, I will only say that the skort combined with some roller skates would make a great outfit for waitresses at a 50s-style drive-in.

My main issue is that the collection is more suited to children's soccer than adult women, due to color choices and the use of the same color for tops and bottoms (which allows a kid's team to not have both dark and light uniforms). The similarity between the teams is also dissappointing. Why not have have a different designer for each team, so that we don't get the effect of the same design with different accents, collars, and colors?

The strongest aspect of the collection is the tailoring of the jerseys so that they need not be tucked. They uniforms look much better when the jerseys are out.

There remains the question how numbers will be handled with respect to font, size, and location. Will the player's name be across upper back? Apparently, the WPS shield logo appears on the right sleeve and a team logo appears above the left breast and on the front of the shorts. And what will the goalkeepers wear? The rules of soccer require the goalkeeper to wear different colors than field players.

Here is the breakdown by team.

Boston Breakers



Love the shade of blue but find the geometric collar to be unattractive and possibly uncomfortable to wear. The shoulder accents remind me of the Indianapolis Colts of the NFL, which is not exactly fashion forward. Nice to see Amy Rodriguez, left, and Angela Hucles, right, stars of the US Women's National Team (USWNT).

Chicago Red Stars



These would make great pajamas for a six year old. The red stars across the chest are very cute but the whole look is just too simple. On a positive note, I prefer this traditional collar option. Carli Lloyd, right, scored the the winning goal for the USWNT in the 2008 Olympic gold medal match against Brazil.

FC Gold Pride (San Francisco Bay Area)



FC stands for Football Club. Same as the Breakers except in black and tan, which are very nice colors. Is the black a nod to the Bay Area's Oakland Raiders? The diagonal stripe accent at the bottom of the jersey is fun. Wouldn't tan socks work better with the dark uniforms? At any rate, this is my second favorite uniform. That's USWNT veteran Leslie Osborne on the left.

Los Angeles Sol



Same as the Breakers and Pride except in dark navy and yellow. The Sol and Pride dark uniforms are just too similar. By the way, that's Brazil's Marta on the left, one of the greatest women's soccer players of all time.

Sky Blue FC (New York/New Jersey)



Same as the Red Stars except in turquoise and Texas Longhorn orange, colors which could be used together but are not. When the jersey is tucked, as modeled by USWNT starting midfielder Heather O'Reilly, it again looks like a kid's pajamas. The orange skort and the geometric collar suggest that USWNT captain and veteran defender Christie Rampone is a drive-in waitress.

St. Louis Athletica



Same as the Red Stars and Sky Blue, but in Philadelphia Eagles green, an adult color. Finally a uniform I can believe in, one that says "this is a pro soccer player in 2009." The dark version is my favorite of the entire collection due to the traditional collar and contrasting white socks (for once!). Love the white piping accent down one side and the color stripe accent on the socks. That's Hope Solo, the USWNT starting goalkeeper, on the left, sporting her new fierce black hair. Previously, she was a blond. USWNT co-captain and starting defender Lori Chalupny, also known as the Ginger Princess, is on the right. Great color choice to compliment her hair.

Washington Freedom



Same as the Athletica but in dark navy and a red orange, which are not used together. I would have preferred to see the navy and orange used on both the dark and light versions.

In summary, the WPS would have been better served by using multiple designers so that each team could present a more unique style. Short of that, Christian should have used bolder colors (e.g. bright red, gold, silver) and given us more "fierce." Short of that, he should have avoided the mono color look or used contrasting socks more often (as he did for my favorite Athleticas). It may be that the single designer/collection approach was in the spirit of keeping expenses down and concentrating the PR on one fashion show. Still waiting to see what fonts will be used for numbers. Some final rankings:

1. Athletica
   
2. FC Gold Pride
   
3. Breakers
   
4. Sky Blue FC
   
5. Freedom
   
6. Sol
   
7. Red Stars

The good news is that the WPS will not sink or swim based on their uniforms. Unlike the previous failed women's pro league, they intend to keep expenses down and play in markets where there might be demand. The success of the US Women's National Team at the 2008 Olympics can't hurt either, as each team has players who wear Olympic gold.