The Toronto Tempo marked another milestone on their road to joining the WNBA — releasing the design of their jerseys. In a highly anticipated drop that included an in-person display at Toronto’s Eaton Centre Mall, the Tempo released their Explorer and Heroine edition jerseys.
Like all WNBA teams, the Tempo will eventually have three jersey editions. The Heroine is the standard white version with the team’s name on it, the Explorer usually features the team’s colorway and city name, and the Rebel jersey is more open to creativity and is meant to depict the team’s identity.
For now, Toronto (like Golden State last season) has only released the Heroine and Explorer editions.
Explorer Edition in Tempo Bordeaux
Image courtesy of Toronto Tempo
The more unique of the two jerseys, the Tempo Explorer jersey features their signature color — Tempo Bordeaux, with blue piping on the edges and the city’s name and the eventual player number in blue as well. Down the sides of the jerseys, under the arms, are the Tempo’s stripes, a nod to their logo (which isn’t technically featured on the jersey).
The back will feature the players’ numbers as well, with their names under the number as opposed to over it. Per the Tempo’s press release, the “modern” color is meant to “expand the franchise’s presence within lifestyle culture, creating a look designed to be worn confidently on and off the court.”
Heroine Edition in White and Borealis Blue
Image courtesy of Toronto Tempo
The Tempo’s alternate jerseys are in white, per WNBA standard. They have ties to the Explorer edition — like in the stripes along the side, and the same kind of number and name placement. This time, it features the team name instead of the city name, with the block letters in Bordeaux with a blue outline.
The piping on the edges is an inverted blue and Bordeaux from the previous jersey as well.
“Today marks another meaningful milestone on our journey to bringing Canada’s first WNBA team to life,” said Whitney Bell, Chief Marketing Officer, Toronto Tempo, in a press release. “Every detail of these uniforms is intentional. From the colour story to the speed lines, we’ve created a design that brings our brand to life and represents our city, our fans, and our team. We cannot wait for our players – and our fans – to wear them with pride.”
A colorway that can’t fail
Similar to most of the Tempo’s design drops over the past year, this jersey reveal was met with some criticism. Definitely not as much as other drops, but still some. What people who enjoy being haters for sport don’t understand is that there are actually a lot of rules when it comes to things like this. The Tempo needed to come up with a design that not only fit within the strict parameters of the WNBA’s design rules, but also was universal enough to, frankly, sell.
One thing that is undeniable about the Tempo is that their colorway is unique. It’s also almost hard to judge it from online pictures, because in person, it looks so much more vibrant. Even when you see these colors on clothes instead of just on your phone, the Bordeaux and Blue pop in a way that is so complementary. These colors have looked phenomenal on clothes (rip my wallet), on signage at various Tempo events/press conferences over the past year, and it’s pretty safe to assume the court will look amazing as well.
As for the design, there are many things about it that work well. The piping on the edges and neckline lends to a vintage look that pairs well with the colors. Layering the colors over one another on the lettering and numbers adds a three-dimensional look that is pleasing as well. The choice to italicize the lettering of the logos and the numbers is also a good design choice, while the stripes on the side are simple and don’t take away from the rest of it, but also work to make sure it’s not too plain.
I saw a few complaints online about the size of the sponsorship logos, and unfortunately, that’s a league-wide trend. This isn’t the NBA, where you don’t have to have large ad patches on jerseys. We are only 5 years removed from the WNBA having standardized jerseys that were the same across the league, only differentiated by colors. Some didn’t even have team names on them, and none had player numbers on the front.
In previous editions of WNBA jerseys, you had versions of jerseys (like the Seattle Storm one on Sue Bird below) that didn’t even have the team name on them. To be five years removed from that and able to have unique, bold jerseys is something new fans based in Toronto who are only just coming into the W to follow the Tempo or more casual observers from recent years may not fully understand.
Remember when it looked like they were the Minnesota Mayo Clinic instead of the Lynx, with the team logo relegated to just a small, upper corner?
Now that we have a bit of perspective, let’s remember how much the game has grown to get to a point where we even get to have a fun and unique jersey drop.
As the press release says, these jerseys are incredibly wearable. They are simple enough to be stackable on other pieces of clothing, yet bold enough to do fine on their own. The colors are something people won’t be wary about wearing on the street, like a lot of other sports teams’ overly loud colors. In a fashion era where simplicity and vintage nods are prominent, these jerseys do a great job of ensuring the team’s on-court look will be bold while ensuring fans will want to sport these no matter where they go.
