One of my favourite childhood photos is of me and my younger brother, both mid-Thierry Henry knee slides celebrating a goal in what looks like an end-to-end game of back garden football. We’re head-to-toe in Arsenal’s 2002/03 blue away kit, complete with the shorts, socks, boots and all. For me, that kit – with the ‘O2’ logo and psychedelic line patterns down the front – is synonymous with Patrick Vieira in my mind, for the way the front of the jersey would shimmer as he lined up in the tunnel before a game, thanks to the famous vapour rub he’d routinely apply to the chest.
As someone who has long been fascinated by football’s impact on culture, I’ve always loved Arsenal’s ability, season after season, to transcend the sport through their kit designs. Each strip conjures up memories – some beautiful, others painful, reminders of near misses and harsher seasons gone by. Regardless, I’d be willing to wager that few teams in world football have a kit archive as strong as Arsenal’s.
Long before football became a fixation of the fashion world, Arsenal kits of all kinds have been worn as symbols of pride and identity far beyond the football pitch. It’s a subject that has entire books, Reddit threads and podcast episodes dedicated to its memory. There are so many to choose from, from the iconic ‘bruised banana’ away strip of the early 1990s, which instantly conjures up images of club legends Ian Wright and the late David Rocastle, to the regal burgundy home kit worn by the likes of Henry during the 2005/06 season, Arsenal’s last at Highbury.
The sweet spot of an iconic kit design combined with a season-defining moment cannot be beaten. In my opinion, one of Arsenal’s most underrated kit designs of all time is the 2001/02 away strip, featuring the shimmering gold jersey with the nostalgic Sega logo across the front. It was in this kit that the club famously won the league at Old Trafford, Sylvain Wiltord scoring the winning goal and wheeling away to celebrate in the corner, with Kanu leaping high in the air over his outstretched arm in front of the away fans. Another all-time classic Arsenal moment that season, Dennis Bergkamp’s stunning pirouette goal against Newcastle, came in the Dreamcast-sponsored home kit, with its memorable red collar and old-school Gunners badge.
Even eras of less beloved kits still evoke fond memories. The 2014/15 to 2018/19 seasons were, in my mind at least, when Arsenal put out some of their less inspired kit designs. The skintight red and white home shirts, and equally tight-fitting yellow and blue away shirts, also happened to accompany some of the toughest times the club has endured on the pitch, with several questionable transfers, as well as the departure of the one and only Arsène Wenger. But there are still moments of pure joy which come to mind when I see those kits, such as watching the mercurial Santi Cazorla and Alexis Sánchez make magic in front of our eyes, and my view of Olivier Giroud’s 2017 Puskás Award-winning scorpion kick on New Year’s Day which will forever be imprinted on my memory.
In recent seasons, things have been taken to a new level. The club is truly back on track with its kit design. Whereas in the past, Arsenal were simply putting out beautiful kits, the club now sees it as a core part of the merchandising strategy to engage with the world of fashion – and not just on the pitch. Last September, for example, Ian Wright was the first model on the runway for Labrum London’s London Fashion Week show, wearing a hat that bore the Arsenal logo.
Arsenal has also been home to some of football’s most fashionable players, including Héctor Bellerín and Reiss Nelson, and have used this reputation to authentically pursue fashion collaborations and accompany kit launches with fashion brand-style campaigns and photo shoots which blend the club’s standout players with fans and creative members of the Arsenal community. They have released special-edition kits with Pharrell Williams’ Humanrace brand, as well as coveted streetwear label Maharishi, while the 2023/24 collaboration with Stella McCartney saw the first bespoke away kit for Arsenal women.
The club has also been quick to meet the cultural zeitgeist, releasing kit designs which are instantly worn by fans and other people who simply like the design, all over London and the world. Arsenal’s Jamaica-inspired pre-match shirt, released on the eve of Notting Hill Carnival in 2022, became an instant sell-out and was worn across the capital in the following days of celebration. The image of the gold and green jersey is intimately linked to the joy and festivity experienced on that Carnival weekend by so many of us who lined the streets.
Much in the way fashion brands are known to, Arsenal have relied on their rich archive of kit designs to provide an updated take on old-school models. The club brought back the famous bruised banana away kit in the 2019/20 season, modelled in the campaign by Ian Wright, alongside the next generation of Arsenal heroes: Bukayo Saka, Gabriel Martinelli and Emile Smith Rowe.
Beyond aesthetics, Arsenal have also used their kits as a platform for powerful messages. Take the all-white ‘No More Red’ kit, first introduced in the 2020/21 season, a blank canvas bearing the names of 52 Londoners lost to knife crime. Much like many of Arsenal’s kit designs over the years, this bold statement proved that a football kit can be more than just a shirt: it can be a catalyst for change, and served as a powerful reminder of the club’s foundations rooted in the culture of London.
In terms of compelling kit designs, this season has been no different. A classic home shirt, an eye-catching bright yellow away trip and a fashionable third kit in green. Hopefully, at the end of the season, there will be some silverware to sit alongside them, cementing their legacy among Arsenal’s decades-long history of world-class kits.
One of my favourite childhood photos is of me and my younger brother, both mid-Thierry Henry knee slides celebrating a goal in what looks like an end-to-end game of back garden football. We’re head-to-toe in Arsenal’s 2002/03 blue away kit, complete with the shorts, socks, boots and all. For me, that kit – with the ‘O2’ logo and psychedelic line patterns down the front – is synonymous with Patrick Vieira in my mind, for the way the front of the jersey would shimmer as he lined up in the tunnel before a game, thanks to the famous vapour rub he’d routinely apply to the chest.
As someone who has long been fascinated by football’s impact on culture, I’ve always loved Arsenal’s ability, season after season, to transcend the sport through their kit designs. Each strip conjures up memories – some beautiful, others painful, reminders of near misses and harsher seasons gone by. Regardless, I’d be willing to wager that few teams in world football have a kit archive as strong as Arsenal’s.
Long before football became a fixation of the fashion world, Arsenal kits of all kinds have been worn as symbols of pride and identity far beyond the football pitch. It’s a subject that has entire books, Reddit threads and podcast episodes dedicated to its memory. There are so many to choose from, from the iconic ‘bruised banana’ away strip of the early 1990s, which instantly conjures up images of club legends Ian Wright and the late David Rocastle, to the regal burgundy home kit worn by the likes of Henry during the 2005/06 season, Arsenal’s last at Highbury.
The sweet spot of an iconic kit design combined with a season-defining moment cannot be beaten. In my opinion, one of Arsenal’s most underrated kit designs of all time is the 2001/02 away strip, featuring the shimmering gold jersey with the nostalgic Sega logo across the front. It was in this kit that the club famously won the league at Old Trafford, Sylvain Wiltord scoring the winning goal and wheeling away to celebrate in the corner, with Kanu leaping high in the air over his outstretched arm in front of the away fans. Another all-time classic Arsenal moment that season, Dennis Bergkamp’s stunning pirouette goal against Newcastle, came in the Dreamcast-sponsored home kit, with its memorable red collar and old-school Gunners badge.
Even eras of less beloved kits still evoke fond memories. The 2014/15 to 2018/19 seasons were, in my mind at least, when Arsenal put out some of their less inspired kit designs. The skintight red and white home shirts, and equally tight-fitting yellow and blue away shirts, also happened to accompany some of the toughest times the club has endured on the pitch, with several questionable transfers, as well as the departure of the one and only Arsène Wenger. But there are still moments of pure joy which come to mind when I see those kits, such as watching the mercurial Santi Cazorla and Alexis Sánchez make magic in front of our eyes, and my view of Olivier Giroud’s 2017 Puskás Award-winning scorpion kick on New Year’s Day which will forever be imprinted on my memory.
In recent seasons, things have been taken to a new level. The club is truly back on track with its kit design. Whereas in the past, Arsenal were simply putting out beautiful kits, the club now sees it as a core part of the merchandising strategy to engage with the world of fashion – and not just on the pitch. Last September, for example, Ian Wright was the first model on the runway for Labrum London’s London Fashion Week show, wearing a hat that bore the Arsenal logo.
Arsenal has also been home to some of football’s most fashionable players, including Héctor Bellerín and Reiss Nelson, and have used this reputation to authentically pursue fashion collaborations and accompany kit launches with fashion brand-style campaigns and photo shoots which blend the club’s standout players with fans and creative members of the Arsenal community. They have released special-edition kits with Pharrell Williams’ Humanrace brand, as well as coveted streetwear label Maharishi, while the 2023/24 collaboration with Stella McCartney saw the first bespoke away kit for Arsenal women.
The club has also been quick to meet the cultural zeitgeist, releasing kit designs which are instantly worn by fans and other people who simply like the design, all over London and the world. Arsenal’s Jamaica-inspired pre-match shirt, released on the eve of Notting Hill Carnival in 2022, became an instant sell-out and was worn across the capital in the following days of celebration. The image of the gold and green jersey is intimately linked to the joy and festivity experienced on that Carnival weekend by so many of us who lined the streets.
Much in the way fashion brands are known to, Arsenal have relied on their rich archive of kit designs to provide an updated take on old-school models. The club brought back the famous bruised banana away kit in the 2019/20 season, modelled in the campaign by Ian Wright, alongside the next generation of Arsenal heroes: Bukayo Saka, Gabriel Martinelli and Emile Smith Rowe.
Beyond aesthetics, Arsenal have also used their kits as a platform for powerful messages. Take the all-white ‘No More Red’ kit, first introduced in the 2020/21 season, a blank canvas bearing the names of 52 Londoners lost to knife crime. Much like many of Arsenal’s kit designs over the years, this bold statement proved that a football kit can be more than just a shirt: it can be a catalyst for change, and served as a powerful reminder of the club’s foundations rooted in the culture of London.
In terms of compelling kit designs, this season has been no different. A classic home shirt, an eye-catching bright yellow away trip and a fashionable third kit in green. Hopefully, at the end of the season, there will be some silverware to sit alongside them, cementing their legacy among Arsenal’s decades-long history of world-class kits.
One of my favourite childhood photos is of me and my younger brother, both mid-Thierry Henry knee slides celebrating a goal in what looks like an end-to-end game of back garden football. We’re head-to-toe in Arsenal’s 2002/03 blue away kit, complete with the shorts, socks, boots and all. For me, that kit – with the ‘O2’ logo and psychedelic line patterns down the front – is synonymous with Patrick Vieira in my mind, for the way the front of the jersey would shimmer as he lined up in the tunnel before a game, thanks to the famous vapour rub he’d routinely apply to the chest.
As someone who has long been fascinated by football’s impact on culture, I’ve always loved Arsenal’s ability, season after season, to transcend the sport through their kit designs. Each strip conjures up memories – some beautiful, others painful, reminders of near misses and harsher seasons gone by. Regardless, I’d be willing to wager that few teams in world football have a kit archive as strong as Arsenal’s.
Long before football became a fixation of the fashion world, Arsenal kits of all kinds have been worn as symbols of pride and identity far beyond the football pitch. It’s a subject that has entire books, Reddit threads and podcast episodes dedicated to its memory. There are so many to choose from, from the iconic ‘bruised banana’ away strip of the early 1990s, which instantly conjures up images of club legends Ian Wright and the late David Rocastle, to the regal burgundy home kit worn by the likes of Henry during the 2005/06 season, Arsenal’s last at Highbury.
The sweet spot of an iconic kit design combined with a season-defining moment cannot be beaten. In my opinion, one of Arsenal’s most underrated kit designs of all time is the 2001/02 away strip, featuring the shimmering gold jersey with the nostalgic Sega logo across the front. It was in this kit that the club famously won the league at Old Trafford, Sylvain Wiltord scoring the winning goal and wheeling away to celebrate in the corner, with Kanu leaping high in the air over his outstretched arm in front of the away fans. Another all-time classic Arsenal moment that season, Dennis Bergkamp’s stunning pirouette goal against Newcastle, came in the Dreamcast-sponsored home kit, with its memorable red collar and old-school Gunners badge.
Even eras of less beloved kits still evoke fond memories. The 2014/15 to 2018/19 seasons were, in my mind at least, when Arsenal put out some of their less inspired kit designs. The skintight red and white home shirts, and equally tight-fitting yellow and blue away shirts, also happened to accompany some of the toughest times the club has endured on the pitch, with several questionable transfers, as well as the departure of the one and only Arsène Wenger. But there are still moments of pure joy which come to mind when I see those kits, such as watching the mercurial Santi Cazorla and Alexis Sánchez make magic in front of our eyes, and my view of Olivier Giroud’s 2017 Puskás Award-winning scorpion kick on New Year’s Day which will forever be imprinted on my memory.
In recent seasons, things have been taken to a new level. The club is truly back on track with its kit design. Whereas in the past, Arsenal were simply putting out beautiful kits, the club now sees it as a core part of the merchandising strategy to engage with the world of fashion – and not just on the pitch. Last September, for example, Ian Wright was the first model on the runway for Labrum London’s London Fashion Week show, wearing a hat that bore the Arsenal logo.
Arsenal has also been home to some of football’s most fashionable players, including Héctor Bellerín and Reiss Nelson, and have used this reputation to authentically pursue fashion collaborations and accompany kit launches with fashion brand-style campaigns and photo shoots which blend the club’s standout players with fans and creative members of the Arsenal community. They have released special-edition kits with Pharrell Williams’ Humanrace brand, as well as coveted streetwear label Maharishi, while the 2023/24 collaboration with Stella McCartney saw the first bespoke away kit for Arsenal women.
The club has also been quick to meet the cultural zeitgeist, releasing kit designs which are instantly worn by fans and other people who simply like the design, all over London and the world. Arsenal’s Jamaica-inspired pre-match shirt, released on the eve of Notting Hill Carnival in 2022, became an instant sell-out and was worn across the capital in the following days of celebration. The image of the gold and green jersey is intimately linked to the joy and festivity experienced on that Carnival weekend by so many of us who lined the streets.
Much in the way fashion brands are known to, Arsenal have relied on their rich archive of kit designs to provide an updated take on old-school models. The club brought back the famous bruised banana away kit in the 2019/20 season, modelled in the campaign by Ian Wright, alongside the next generation of Arsenal heroes: Bukayo Saka, Gabriel Martinelli and Emile Smith Rowe.
Beyond aesthetics, Arsenal have also used their kits as a platform for powerful messages. Take the all-white ‘No More Red’ kit, first introduced in the 2020/21 season, a blank canvas bearing the names of 52 Londoners lost to knife crime. Much like many of Arsenal’s kit designs over the years, this bold statement proved that a football kit can be more than just a shirt: it can be a catalyst for change, and served as a powerful reminder of the club’s foundations rooted in the culture of London.
In terms of compelling kit designs, this season has been no different. A classic home shirt, an eye-catching bright yellow away trip and a fashionable third kit in green. Hopefully, at the end of the season, there will be some silverware to sit alongside them, cementing their legacy among Arsenal’s decades-long history of world-class kits.
