Naomi Osaka saw what Zendaya did on the Challengers press tour and said, “bet.” She double-triple-quadrupled down on theme-dressing and took the court at the US Open looking like a literal tennis ball. Lime green visor, two lime green wristbands, lime green dress with a white stripe around the middle like the balls have lines.
And that’s not all! The ball is fuzzy, but Osaka is frilly, with ruffles around the arm holes of her top and even bigger ruffles on the sides of her skirt. Were her shoes white with lime green accents and lime green bows on the back? I think you know they were.
And that’s just her sportswear. Osaka arrived to the match in a cropped white zip-up with a pull on the zipper that’s a little silver tennis ball. Her white Beats headphones were decorated with white frills and a green ribbon, with two green bows over each ear. Popped a white bow on her duffel bag too.
And she had an outer layer apron-type piece going over her skirt that was white tulle with lime green over it. Plus she (okay, Nike, it was a custom fit in collaboration with Japanese brand Ambush) stuck an enormous bow on the back of her jacket. If this was an attempt at dopamine dressing, it worked. Osaka won and told the press afterward, “I so badly wanted to step on these courts again. I didn’t know if I could.… Just to win this match, just to be in this atmosphere means so much to me.”
Anime-coded in the best way.
Other outlets are reporting this look as “Brat” coded due to the shade’s similarity to the cover of Charli XCX’s new album. With all due respect to Charli, absolutely not. Bows are not brat, and you will never convince me Naomi Osaka doesn’t just think it’s fun to dress like a tennis ball. And she’s right, it’s so fun.
