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Can Balenciaga do it on a wet Tuesday night in Stoke?
Football managers in the ‘90s weren’t known for their sense of style. Fierce tacticians and men of steel they may have been, but the ‘Blackburn Rovers jacket over a suit and tie’ look never quite took off on the streets.
Today, managers come from a different crop. They’re often ex-players who came up in the ‘90s designer label boom. They know the department store staff by name. They understand fit and quality. They’re men other men look to for inspiration. Which is how a small British brand operating out of a south coast idyll has found itself at the centre of football’s more unlikely fashion stories.
Sandbanks, named after the luxury Dorset peninsula where it was founded, was launched in 2019 with an aim to make timeless items with a focus on quality and sustainability built in. This meant using premium thread from recycled plastic bottles, while interrogating all areas of the supply chain to produce a truly ethical product. It’s the kind of attention to detail and fabric innovation that’s traditionally gone down well with outerwear-obsessed football fans. Think Massimo Osti’s garment tech credentials. So it was no surprise to see the Sandbanks logo appearing in crowds within a short few years, and having Jamie Redknapp as a brand ambassador cemented the relationship with football culture.
What’s unique about the Sandbanks story is that the buzz began not with teenagers on the terraces, as we’d expect from designer labels at football, but on-screen, worn by managers, ex-pros and pundits. Neville, Carragher and Richards are regularly decked out. Former Luton Town manager Rob Edwards’ grey Sandbanks puffer kicked off a TikTok jacket ID search in 2024, with menswear bloggers commenting on how the brand’s sunshine logo had taken over the touchline. Even The Athletic wrote that year: “Are you even a football manager if, when you open your wardrobe, you aren’t suddenly drowning in Sandbanks coats?”
Sandbanks have since pioneered partnerships with clubs like Bournemouth and Brentford to provide team outerwear, the first deals of their kind in the UK. The formula is one that’s earned a stable of hallowed brands a place within football culture over the years: technical innovation, consistency and timeless design. In this new era where style and football are closer than ever, Sandbanks may just have cracked it.
Shop Sandbanks at Badge online now.