Team Togs: Athletic Club

Considering I, myself am not a fan of La Liga - it's quite surprising that I've managed to do three La Liga teams in such a short period of time! I have gotten another request to do Athletic Bilbao and while I was truly confused on where to start - I decided to give it a shot. With a handful of facts and little knowledge of La Liga - I began to tackle the challenge woefully.

Knowing that Athletic is a Basque team, I decided to play with their seafarer history and focus on clean nautical lines as the theme of the outfit. However, I wanted to avoid that Americana nautical look so I disregarded all kinds of anchors, stripes and navy - the quintessential styles associated with looks inspired by the sea. Instead, I chose classic silhouettes such as a sun dress and a 60s-style 3/4 sleeve coat.

While the colours of Athletic are red and white stripes, I have decided to take some creative freedom and avoid a literal translation. With a bold red sun dress, it is tamed with a white coat and a very structured minimal, no fuss bag. The sea life is all about beauty in functionality and the bag represents this attitude very well. Adding a Basque touch is the black beret where it is a part of the national costume. This beret has more attitude to the ones donned by the Basque men however, with a dramatic feather detail.

For jewellery, more tribute to the sea is done through a shark tooth pendant - where without being too obviously nautical, it is a direct homage to marine life. The ears are decorated with more minimalist fashion in a pair of gold square studs and the feet with quirky yet elegant lion paw pumps where it is a play on the team's nickname: Los Leones (the Lions).

Dress, Jaeger, £160
Coat, Giambattista Valli, £2,735
Bag, Anya Hindmarch, £1,031
Beret, vintage Henry G. Ross, £220
Pendant, Heather Gardner, £106
Earrings, Lord & Taylor, £220 (on sale)
Pumps, Christian Louboutin, £3,152