Welspun Living Limited is proud to celebrate its continued partnership with the Wimbledon Championships as their official towel manufacturers through its subsidiary brand Christy. This year, the brand’s terry towel facility in Vapi, Gujarat will mark 15 years of manufacturing the iconic Wimbledon Championships towels. The cult towels, renowned for being draped across the shoulders of tennis champions from Carlos Alcaraz to Pete Sampras and the Williams sisters – to name only a few – is getting a new look in 2024.
“We are thrilled to extend our partnership with Wimbledon and reveal the design inspiration behind the 2024 Championships Towel. We have reinvented tradition.” shared Vanshika Goenka-Misra, CEO of Christy. “We are incredibly fortunate to have such exceptional manufacturing ability in our own facilities, enabling us to achieve highly specialised effects on our towels, ensuring they are not only recognisable but also iconic when captured on both the courts and TV. A huge amount goes into the design and delivery of the annual towel and it’s great to see this year pushing the boundary, creating a new take on a familiar icon”.
Welspun Living’s Christy has been the Official Towel Supplier for 37 years. Reflecting the ever-increasing rise in popularity of all racket sports in the UK and globally, the towel has been redesigned. Making the change from landscape to portrait, the towel features silhouettes of players ‘in play’ and is intended to celebrate the much loved sport, tennis.
Upholding both Wimbledon and Welspun’s high sustainability standards, the unisex towel will bear the OEKO-TEX® MADE IN GREEN label. Regarded as a piece of cultural history, the towel, which is released annually in the classic Wimbledon ‘GREEN & PURPLE’ and the latest fashion colourway, has grown to become a signifier for the year. 2023 was hot pink and this year follows an equally statement-like suit. The ‘HYACINTH & LAVENDER’ towel, which was devised in consultation with Global trend forecasting group WGSN to be mood and wellbeing boosting in colour, and the traditional ‘GREEN & PURPLE’ colourway, will uphold the towels global appeal.
Made using innovative HygroCotton® technology the towel is created from super absorbent cotton, the yarns are spun with unique manufacturing process , making a supremely fluffy towel that will dry quickly, ideal for sports or vacation.
The 2024 towel is a celebration of what’s at the core of The Championships, the players; their skill, hard work and their physicality featuring both male and female players in motion. By combining two different colour yarns to construct the fabric, the Championships Towel is built of two colours, but is striking both front and back.
Synonymous with The Championships and winning moments, great lengths are taken to ensure the towels will compliment and not detract from the on-screen action when viewed outside of the court. The colours are screen tested to ensure they perform, but that they also look good on camera.
In celebration of this iconic item of British culture getting a new look, the 2024 Championships towels are promoted through a CGI campaign, ‘Icons Meet Icons’. Through a series of videos, the famous championship towel stylishly wraps some of the world’s most iconic landmarks, including the Gateway of India, Statue of Liberty, Elizabeth Tower, and Burj Al Arab in Dubai.
Additionally for 2024, Christy is introducing a limited edition of Wimbledon bathroom towels, the ‘Logo Towel’ and the ‘Ace Towel’. The life of the Championships towels continue beyond Championship Point with the launch of the ‘Heirloom Collection’. The new collection will see surplus Wimbledon stock up-cycled annually into varying wearable fashion pieces – this year the ‘Heirloom Bag’.
