Next year, the Michael Jordan–owned Charlotte NBA team will be reassuming the Hornets mantle. Here’s the story behind the original Hornets’ early ’90s sports merchandise juggernaut.
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By 1988, Carolina native Alexander Julian had established himself in New York as a fashion designer known for incorporating bright colors into upscale men's clothing. Twenty-five years later, his company is still going strong, and his most popular contribution to menswear is remembered for its bold combination of teal and purple — but it's not an item of high fashion. Julian's signature work is a basketball jersey, the one worn by the erstwhile Charlotte Hornets, perhaps the most unlikely sports-business success story of the last half-century. It was an item that became a national sales phenomenon despite being affiliated with an expansion team that never advanced beyond the second round of the playoffs during their 15 seasons in North Carolina. By 1995, just seven seasons into the franchise's existence, more Hornets jerseys were sold than any other team's in the NBA. And it wasn't only jerseys that sold; Starter jackets featuring the bold Hornets teal continue to top twentysomethings' lists of favorite childhood wardrobe items.
The Hornets eventually moved to New Orleans — where they've now renamed themselves the New Orleans Pelicans — because their owner couldn't get along with city officials or fans, but the Hornets' mystique has proven so enduring that the team's NBA successors in Carolina, the Michael Jordan–owned Charlotte Bobcats, are now announcing that they're going to be reassuming the Hornets name. Crucially, the Bobcats haven't yet commented on whether they'll be bringing back the original Hornets uniforms and color scheme. But they'd be crazy not to take advantage of a design that was such a phenomenon.
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"When it came out, I felt like I had dropped a teal bomb on Charlotte," Julian said. "There was a new housing development that changed its name to 'Teal Acres.' The Park Hotel, which was the best hotel in town, changed its logo to teal. The towels were embroidered in teal. I felt a little like Doctor Frankenstein. I had created a monster. It took off like crazy." Julian grew up the son of a men's clothing store owner in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. In terms of passion for basketball, few places rival the hometown of the Tar Heels, and Julian was always a fan. He graduated from the school in 1969 and has since sent four of his children to UNC. He never took to following the NBA with anything more than cursory interest until the late 1980s, when talk of a professional basketball team in Charlotte began circulating. George Shinn, the businessman who ultimately brought the Hornets to Charlotte (and took them to New Orleans), happened to share a banker with Julian. That banker introduced Julian to Shinn, who included him in a jersey-design process that had gotten into some early PR trouble.
"Way before there was any talk about involving me in the design, the fashion editor of the Charlotte Observer asked George if they knew what kind of colors they were going to use," Julian said. "He said he didn't know but that they'd try to use the same ones chosen by the architect of the stadium, and when they mentioned that pink was one of them, she jumped. She had an artist design a pink uniform and ran it in the newspaper, and the reaction from radio shock jocks was horrific. I wasn't there, but what I can tell you is when we had the press conference to announce that I was going to design the uniforms, the first 14 questions I took from the press were about whether or not I was going to use pink."