English Version | Sport zone

Let's get straight to the point: this has nothing to do with the rags we wore around the house during the COVID-19 pandemic. Those cotton shirts with two or three holes in them, those sweatpants from high school, those hoodies that have been in the washing machine too many times. These are all part of our "war clothes", items that we keep indefinitely in case a catastrophe happens — as it did — and we need reserves and supplies. You'd never catch us in Príncipe Real on a Sunday afternoon with one of these relics on. However, if the subject is something else — something similar — but something else, then we understand each other. Those shorts we bought at last year's summer sales, from the new American lifestyle brand (very expensive!), have a purpose: weekend brunch, photos for social media, and possibly a night out, combined with a loose shirt and heels. The sneakers we ordered from Japan (no one could dream that we paid so much for shipping...) are not for the gym, but for combining with floral dresses, long satin skirts and low-waisted jeans. The shaping lycra leggings in the animal pattern aren't destined (just) for yoga classes, in fact, they're supposed to go straight to the trip we're planning to Bali, but as there are still a few months to go we're going to wear them on a daily basis, therefore they’re basic. We could go on with endless examples (even the bags in which "training clothes" are kept seem to have been elevated to the category of "street purses"), and in the end we would come to the same conclusion: sportswear, or apparently sportswear, is here to stay. From the tennis courts and boxing rings to the cities, it has become the uniform du jour, and is no longer what you wear "a few times a day" but what you wear "during the day" — regardless of whether that day includes sport or not.

We learned to call it sportswear, then we got the hang of it and now we give it a more pompous name: athleisure. Much like the clothes we wear to work out, it's actually what we wear when we want to look presentable, comfortable and apparently relaxed — that very blasé cool, bordering on "This? It was right in the closet, I didn't even see it!". As Robert Williams, journalist and luxury editor at Business of Fashion, said, "athleisure is part of the casualization of luxury" — it's a status symbol, a new way of differentiating ourselves from another part of the population, which has to wear a uniform, or formal clothes, to work; it's also a way of saying "I have time for me", "I take care of myself", because even if it doesn't involve a drop of sweat, athleisure indicates that well-being (even if millimetrically thought out) is the first concern of those who wear it. In fact, nowadays, luxury means being able to make the most of your time, and deciding what you do with it — including doing or not doing sport. It's a style that communicates the importance given to relaxation, the pleasures of life, the simple things... the little luxuries. Whether or not that involves exercise... We'll see.

Translated from the original in the "Winners Never Quit" issue, published July 2024. Full stories and credits in the print version.