Wimbledon’s First Fashion Scandal

This year’s Wimbledon marks the centennial of the tournament’s first, though hardly its last, fashion scandal. In 1919, a 20-year-old Frenchwoman named Suzanne Lenglen made her Wimbledon debut in a shockingly skimpy ensemble: a low-neck dress with short sleeves and a calf-length pleated skirt, her silk stockings rolled down to just above her knees, and a floppy hat covering her cropped hair. She didn’t wear a corset. She didn’t even wear a petticoat. Though the press called her outfit “indecent,” Lenglen went on to win the tournament—and the next four Wimbledon championships, as well as two French Opens and three Olympic medals.

One hundred years ago—when female players typically wore the same ankle-length skirts and high-necked, long-sleeved blouses on and off the court—Lenglen’s winning streak, her short-sleeved dress gave way to sleeveless dresses, and her linen hat to a much-copied headband, dubbed by the media the “Lenglen bandeau.” Instead of with shapely heels, she wore flat, rubber-soled “.” Originally chosen for comfort on the tennis court, these chic, practical styles soon spilled over into women’s everyday wardrobes. At the height of her career, Lenglen was the most famous female athlete in the world, a mainstay of sports pages, gossip columns, and fashion magazines alike. By 1926, when to mark the 50th championship at Wimbledon, it was the young athlete, not the formidable monarch, who was the global fashion influencer.