Polos, crocs, Chinese idiograms – why NZ may have got it wrong!

Well, to start with, sportswear should not be designed by a committee! But after the last Olympics, when a fuss was kicked up about the Kiwi Olympic team being kitted out by a non-NZ manufacturer, this time around things have changed – but has it been for the better? The New Zealand Olympic Committee (NZOC) and clothing consortium DesignTex got together in a partnership to produce uniforms for the opening ceremony as well as non-competition wear. The uniform, designed by this hybrid company, which is called Kapinua, includes a track suit, short and long sleeved T-shirts, casual shorts, polo shirts, a blazer with either trousers or a skirt, sports tops, cap and sports socks … and Crocs! Yes, black, clog-like footwear will feature in the NZ team suitcases. So they are going to look like those wallies one sees scuffing their way along the High Street with their little bags of Sunday morning recycling, aren’t they?

But it does get worse. While their T-shirts and polo shirts are made from high-performance micro-fibre, which is designed to manage moisture, and New Zealand merino wool has been used in some garments, they made the classic mistake of including three Chinese characters on the clothing which, they say, mean New Zealand. Do they really? Does nobody learn anything from experience? Didn’t David Beckham once have a tattoo that he thought said Victoria in Hindi but actually reads Vichtoria? And I wonder what the ‘three characters’ actually say – possibly it reads ‘they didn’t pay me enough to translate this properly’!

Sportswear should be designed by sports designers, not committees, and while NZ should be applauded by wanting to make their clothing at home, they may regret not having hired a top class designer to give their team some confidence.

Kapinua polo-shirt courtesy of Kapinua

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Add comment May 5th, 2008