Breaking the Ice: Streetwear Brand Nahmias Heats Up Hockey With New Arizona Coyotes Collab
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Doni Nahmias grew up skateboarding and surfing in the sunny, coastal California enclave of Summerland, a town whose breezy name perfectly encapsulates the sandy beaches and balmy mood of its residents and surroundings. As a teenager, Nahmias would spend his mornings in the ocean, and afternoons on the basketball court, with evenings reserved for dreaming — and scheming — up ideas for one day making it in fashion. For Nahmias, “Winter” was just a word for the few short months between Thanksgiving and Easter; in Summerland, snow and ice were as far from mind as it was from the very name of the town itself.
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And yet.
When Nahmias was approached last year to create a new apparel collection for the Arizona Coyotes hockey team, the menswear designer immediately jumped at the opportunity. Though he’d never taken to the ice (at least not without falling) or picked up a puck, the worlds of sports and fashion, Nahmias concluded, are beautifully intertwined — and this was a project he couldn’t pass up.
“There is a connection of art between sports and fashion,” the Coyotes’ newly-announced Creative Strategist tells Rolling Stone: “How you work on your craft, how you want to push the boundaries everyday, the competitiveness of the space. Both,” he says, “are art forms.”
And so when Nahmias got the call to design something for the Coyotes, the athlete — and the artist — in him quickly got to work. Nahmias spent months researching vintage sporting gear while getting to know the colors and textures of the Arizona landscape, and the legacy of the NHL team and its fans.
The result: a four-piece capsule collection that features a hoodie, sweatpants, jersey and hat, all rendered in Arizona-inspired colors of red, beige, black and white. Taking codes from typography, street art and the desert, the pieces are designed to be worn on — or off — the rink, as foundational for active lifestyles as they are for chilling and watching the game from home. The collaboration also includes a pair of ice skates done in conjunction with Bauer Hockey, an iconic name in the sport. Though Nahmias hasn’t strapped on a pair of skates in years, he says it wasn’t difficult to reimagine the ice hockey aesthetic.
“I’ve always looked to hockey for inspiration and mood boarding,” he says, citing the “big oversized jerseys, the throwback uniforms, the toughness of players and the effortless fashion appeal that maybe most haven’t noticed yet. I found this collaboration to be a special opportunity to tap into this space in the most authentic way possible,” he continues, “while bringing a new lens to the game, the sport and the fashion it naturally holds.”
The limited-edition merchandise will be sold at Coyotes home games at Mullett Arena and online at Common Hype. Nahmias recently got to present the Coyotes players with pieces from the collaboration in person, and a number of them will be seen wearing the new custom design Bauer skates on the ice.
For Coyotes Chief Brand Officer Alex Meruelo Jr., Nahmias’ pulse on fashion and his genuine camaraderie made him the ideal collaborator for this project. “Doni has an aura about him that makes everyone feel comfortable,” Muruelo tells Rolling Stone. “We hit it off immediately as we both share a passion for fashion and sports.”
“I knew Doni was perfect for this partnership when I went to his studio years back and wanted to steal everything for my closet,” Meruelo continues. “He understands what’s hot before the rest know. Doni treats his people like family, puts people at ease when they work with him, and that made him a natural choice to work with the Coyotes and our athletes.”
The Nahmias and Bauer partnership is one of the ways Meruelo Jr. is working to inject a dose of fashion and youth appeal to the storied Coyotes franchise, while giving fans a new way to show off their ‘Yotes pride. Nahmias’ appointment as Creative Strategist for 2023-24 follows the team’s appointment of Rhude’s Rhuigi Villaseñor in the same role last year. And the new collection follows similar collaborations in the NHL between Justin Bieber’s Drew House and the Toronto Maple Leafs, and skateboarding brand Dime’s collection with their hometown Montreal Canadiens, to name a few.
Nahmias, meantime, is no stranger to sports and entertainment, with the designer’s pieces consistently seen on everyone from NBA stars to F1 drivers and yes, on Bieber too. And while Nahmias is a California boy at heart, could the new hockey capsule be the motivation that finally gets him to pick up a stick and hit the ice? The designer is playing it coy, but does offer this: “Sports create a special environment and energy – there is nothing quite like it. It brings the best out of people, a competitive edge, emotions, and love,” he says.
“The way an athlete works on their craft, the way they move and position themselves, the way they can create new moves and plays… it’s endless,” he continues. And while he isn’t teeing up slapshots just yet, “Just like fashion, you work on your craft, you improve, you grow,” Nahmias declares. “There are endless forms of creation in both spaces.”
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