Naomi Osaka Transforms the U.S. Open Into a High-Fashion Editorial Stage
Osaka is treating the 2026 U.S. Open as more than a venue, according to The Athletic — she's treating it as a staging ground.
The 28-year-old, a two-time champion at Flushing Meadows, has stretched her signature Grand Slam walk-on moment into a full editorial operation, running photoshoots across the Billie Jean King Tennis Center and curating self-styled pre-practice looks that now sit alongside her match-night outfits. The hook this time is basketball, supplied by Nike, and Osaka has chosen Allen Iverson as her tonal anchor.
The 2026 wardrobe, game-by-game
Per The Athletic's reporting, Osaka's seasonal rotation reads like a tournament bracket of its own. The Australian Open brought a jellyfish-inspired aqua piece. The French Open produced a sequence of overskirts and a glittering bronze dress built to mirror the Eiffel Tower. Wimbledon delivered a meticulously embroidered, snow-white kimono ensemble. Each look, Osaka has noted, is commissioned with her own money and can take over a year to reach final form. The U.S. Open entry — a Dolce & Gabbana dress styled by Law Roach for the media center, with a separate walk-on piece for her first-round match — extends that runway into matchweek itself, not just the walk-on window.
The Iverson read
The New York backdrop sharpens the choice. The city is still running high on the Knicks' first NBA championship in 53 years, won in June. Osaka chose Philadelphia. Against Anastasia Zakharova in round one — a 7-6(6), 7-6(3) win Monday night — her walk-on paid homage to Iverson: cornrows, the sweatband, the arm sleeve, the headband. A second look, a Who Decides War French terry sweatshirt layered over a tulle skirt and stitched with career press clippings, was logged by Vogue. At her pretournament news conference, Osaka paired what she called "a spectacular eBay purchase" — a U.S. Open ball cap from her birth year, 1997 — with an Iverson T-shirt. Asked about the basketball pivot, she kept it compact: Nike set the theme, and she delivered. On Iverson himself, per The Athletic: he's a trailblazer, and someone she looks up to for what he's done in fashion — on purpose or not.
Scaling the lane
Osaka is not the only player running this scheme. Nike's basketball theme has defending women's champion Aryna Sabalenka in a bright-orange netted dress and returning men's champion Carlos Alcaraz in a tank top cut like a jersey. Osaka, per The Athletic, is the one stretching it furthest — editorial shoots around the grounds, '90s and early 2000s nostalgia cues, and an embedded code that pairs her initials with Iverson's. The tactical read: she's not just walking onto court. She's walking into a lane no one else on the tour currently occupies, and the data point that matters most isn't her first-round scoreline — it's that the runway keeps getting longer.
