WIMBLEDON, England - Wimbledon has long required players to wear outfits that are 'predominantly in white' or 'almost entirely in white.'
But this year, a 10-part decree was introduced in the competitors' guide stating that 'white does not include off white or cream' and allowing only 'a single trim of color no wider than one centimeter.' The almost-all-white rule now explicitly covers caps, headbands, bandannas, wristbands, shoes and even 'any undergarments that either are or can be visible during play (including due to perspiration).'
Richard Lewis, chief executive of the All England Club, said the time was right to make accessories subject to the policy used for shirts, shorts and socks.
The usually unflappable Roger Federer, a seven-time Wimbledon champion, sounded exasperated this week when asked about the rules.
'White, white, full-on white,' he said. 'I think it's very strict. My personal opinion: I think it's too strict.'
'If you look at the pictures of Edberg, Becker, there was some colors,' Federer added, referring to the Wimbledon champions Stefan Edberg and Boris Becker.
The more specific dress code, which clothing designers and players were notified of months in advance, has been strictly enforced. In the qualifying rounds, the American Rhyne Williams was told to cover the black underside of his hat brim with white tape before he could continue playing. Even Martina Navratilova, a nine-time Wimbledon champion, was told that the pale blue stripe on the skirt she was wearing for an invitational doubles match was against the rules.
Navratilova questioned how a tradition was being upheld if the type of clothing she had been allowed to wear for decades, some of which is in the Wimbledon Museum, was suddenly verboten.
'I think they've gone too far,' she said.
The crackdown comes after years of clothing manufacturers' adding more pops of color to Wimbledon ensembles in an attempt to stand out in a sea of white. In 2010, Serena Williams wore an off-white dress with red trim and bright red undershorts. She described the outfit as a tribute to Wimbledon's traditional snack, strawberries and cream.
When she won her fifth Wimbledon title, in 2012, Williams accented her white dress with a headband, wristbands and undershorts in magenta. Williams's opponent in the final, Agnieszka Radwanska, wore black undershorts; Williams's semifinal opponent, Victoria Azarenka, wore undershorts that were bright blue. Marion Bartoli won last year's women's final while wearing a beige headband.
One of the tipping points for the rule change might have come last year, when Federer wore white shoes with orange soles for his first-round match. Tournament officials told him that the color was too much and that he had to change his shoes for the next match.
Tennis whites became a phenomenon in the late 1800s to prevent the appearance of unseemly sweat stains as the sport became an increasingly popular social gathering.
'One problem which simply had to be addressed very early on was that of perspiration,' Valerie Warren wrote in 'Tennis Fashion: Over 125 Years of Costume Change.' 'As increased skill at the game led to more movement on court, this in turn led to the dreaded problem of perspiration causing the appearance of embarrassing damp patches on colored fabrics. It was quite unthinkable that a lady should be seen to perspire!'
Wearing white at Wimbledon was a matter of tradition, not stipulation, for the next six decades.
Ted Tinling, a British player who pioneered fashions in women's tennis after his retirement, made one of the first introductions of color at Wimbledon in 1947 when he sewed short trims of light blue and pink onto the hems of dresses for the British player Joy Gannon.
In his memoir 'Sixty Years in Tennis,' Tinling recalled the uproar caused by a similar dress he made for Betty Hilton the next year when she played in the Wightman Cup, a team competition held at Wimbledon. Hazel Wightman, the namesake of the event and a matriarchal figure in American tennis in that era, objected to the intrusion of color and even suggested that Hilton had lost because she was 'self-conscious about the color on her dress.'
The next day, Wightman asked the Wimbledon committee to ban the dresses, and in 1949, there were signs in the Wimbledon dressing rooms saying, 'Competitors are required to wear all-white clothing.'
Tinling would venture into color again in 1962, when he made Maria Bueno a dress with a lining described as 'shocking pink.' The next year, Wimbledon made it a condition of entry that competitors must wear clothing that was 'predominantly in white throughout,' a vaguely worded rule that was written in all capital letters and enforced unpredictably, but carried the threat of disqualification if a player failed to comply.
When the United States Open became the first international tournament to allow colored apparel, in 1972, Wimbledon did not budge.
Still, large swatches of color on shirts and dresses showed up at Wimbledon for decades, and players enjoyed seeing how far the rule could be bent.
'I had all white on, with white bloomers, but they had red ruffles,' said Chris Evert, a three-time Wimbledon champion. 'They weren't noticeable at all because our dresses were longer. But the guy, he lifted up my skirt and looked at the red and told me to go back to the changing room and change them.'
Enforcement was inconsistent. During his five Wimbledon title runs, Bjorn Borg wore a white shirt with green pinstripes and a navy collar, which became a popular seller for Fila. Designers for the company assumed that they would not need approval in 2001 when dressing its players in an identical design as part of a retrospective collection, but the All England Club rejected the design, and emergency white shirts had to be raced from Italy to England.
Martin Mulligan, a 1962 Wimbledon finalist who has worked for Fila in global tennis promotions for 41 years, said he appreciated the clarity but not the effect of the new regulations.
'Clothing manufacturers really don't like it because we all look the same, always,' he said.
Danny Lieberman, vice president of apparel for Fila, said sales of white tennis outfits tended to lag behind sales of the same designs in more vivid colors.
'All-white, generally in the United States, is not your best-selling collection,' he said. 'People here like color.'
Wimbledon photographers like color, too. In 2007, Tatiana Golovin wore an approved Lacoste outfit, a short white dress with red shorts underneath. After her first-round victory, several newspapers printed pictures with her head cropped out, focusing instead on her undershorts. The first question Golovin was asked in her news conference was, 'Can I ask you about your knickers?'
'I played so bad that year,' said Golovin, who is working as a commentator at Wimbledon this year. 'It was the last thing I wanted to get attention for.'
Pat Cash won Wimbledon in 1987 wearing a black-and-white checkered bandanna, and he has kept the accessory as he has transitioned to the seniors circuit. Cash won the senior invitational doubles event at Wimbledon the past four years, but he pulled out of this year's competition last week because of back pain and the new rules, which would have required him to buy new specialized shoes for his surgically repaired knee, as well as a new bandanna.
Cash blamed the stricter rules and enforcement on the clothing companies that tried to bend the former standards.
'They pushed it too far, and now everybody's suffering from it,' he said.
'I think white is great,' he added. 'But I think it's a little bit strict and a bit old-fashioned. Tennis in this country, and I think a lot of places around the world, was seen as a bit square, and for many years it's broken out of that. Now it has sort of gone backwards a little bit in that direction. We want the kids to pick it up and want to play tennis, not to think, 'Aw, I've got to wear white and collars and all that to play tennis?' '
But Venus Williams, who has her own clothing design company, EleVen, and often sports some of the most distinctive looks at tennis tournaments, did not bristle at the stricter rules.
'I think it's a nice change,' she said. 'I think everyone just kind of glows in white.'
Eugenie Bouchard of Canada, left, shakes with Romania's Simona Halep after winning their semi-final match in straight sets at Wimbledon. Photograph: Matthew Stockman/Getty Images
By Mike Murphy-Pyle, Chief Reporter
