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AI garment reconstruction: Suzanne Lenglen, Wimbledon 1919. Suzanne Lenglen’s loose white short-sleeved blouse and abbreviated pleated skirt at Wimbledon in 1919

Match kit · AI garment reconstruction.

Suzanne Lenglen · 1919

The dress that moved

Bare forearms and a liberated hemline announced that a tennis dress could be built for movement.

Athlete
Suzanne Lenglen
Tournament
Wimbledon
Date
5 July 1919
Design
Designer not documented · later dressed by Jean Patou
Tournament finish
WSingles

The original look

Suzanne Lenglen playing in a short-sleeved white dress at Wimbledon in 1919.

Topical Press Agency / Hulton Archive / Getty Images · Via Hia · Editorial reference; public reuse permission has not been obtained. Cropped and resized for web.

View original photograph & source ↗

The story behind the look

When Lenglen won her first Wimbledon title in 1919, her relaxed short-sleeved top and shorter skirt sharply contrasted with the restrictive layers still associated with women’s tennis. The clothes allowed the lunges and sweeping movement that made her play look so modern.

Lenglen would soon become closely associated with couturier Jean Patou and the bandeau, pleats and calf-baring silhouettes that defined her image. This entry begins one year earlier, with the Wimbledon appearance that made a freer tennis wardrobe impossible to ignore.