The Latest Stop on the New York Liberty's Victory Tour? The Met Gala.
In a design studio high above West 38th Street in Manhattan on Saturday, the W.N.B.A. star Breanna Stewart positioned a felt jockey cap on top of her wavy brown hair. There were no basketballs, or horses, in sight.
'I don't even know who I am right now,' she said.
Sabrina Ionescu, her teammate on the New York Liberty, was across the room trying on a cropped tuxedo jacket with dramatic tails.
'You look like an inspector — the guy from 'The Pink Panther,'' she told Ms. Stewart, who curled her hand into the shape of a monocle and held it up to her eye. Both erupted with laughter.
The athletes were visiting the designer Sergio Hudson to finalize their looks for the Met Gala, which they attended on Monday with their New York Liberty teammate Jonquel Jones and the franchise's owner, Clara Wu Tsai. The gala is a stop on their victory tour after claiming the team's first ever W.N.B.A. championship in October.
They wore coordinating black-and-white ensembles by Mr. Hudson, a designer with a flair for power suiting who dressed both Michelle Obama and Vice President Kamala Harris for Inauguration Day in 2021.
At the Liberty players' recent fitting, Earth, Wind & Fire played on a portable speaker as Mr. Hudson tweaked hemlines and surveyed footwear options. After helping Ms. Jones slide on a sharp-shouldered, crocodile-print leather jacket, he watched like a proud parent as she shimmied to the music, clearly pleased with her attire.
'I'm really excited for the girls to walk into their fullness and their fashion-drama-diva moments,' Mr. Hudson said, 'and for the world to see these champions.'
His designs were informed by FaceTime conversations with each player about the silhouettes they felt best wearing. Ms. Jones said she saw this year's Costume Institute exhibition, which focuses on Black dandyism, as a natural way to show off her inclination toward men's wear.
'When I'm dressed up, I push the envelope of what femininity is — and what masculinity is, too,' said Ms. Jones, a center who was named the most valuable player of the W.N.B.A. finals.
Although Ms. Jones is drawn to fashion — one of her first big purchases as a rookie was three leather jackets — she said it could be difficult to find pieces that work on her 6-foot-6 frame. There were no such issues with the bespoke suit by Mr. Hudson, which included her initials, J.J., embroidered on the sleeve.
Once he and Ms. Jones were satisfied with the fit, she changed back into her orange Crocs and headed for the elevator.
While Anna Wintour often recruits athletes to attend the Met Gala, only two W.N.B.A. players have attended in recent years: Brittney Griner and Angel Reese, who is on this year's host committee. The Liberty players hope to flourish in the growing overlap between the fashion world and the W.N.B.A.
'This moment expands who gets to be seen and celebrated in fashion,' Ms. Wu Tsai said in an emailed statement.
Ms. Ionescu, a guard and the first women's basketball player to sell a unisex shoe with Nike, attended her first Paris Fashion Week this year. At the Met Gala, she wore her cropped tuxedo jacket over a white bustier and a fitted evening skirt.
'We're always in uniform on the court, so I'm really excited to tell a little bit of the duality of myself as an individual,' she said. (She also hopes to talk to Serena Williams.)
Ms. Stewart, a forward, wore a cream suit that Mr. Hudson said was inspired by the androgynous, 1970s-rocker style of Mick and Bianca Jagger. At an earlier fitting, its sequined blouse had seemed at risk of bunching up under Ms. Stewart's jacket.
'He literally just cut the sleeves off,' Ms. Stewart said, wide-eyed in recollection of the designer's willingness to hack up his own creation.
'I wanted her to be comfortable!' Mr. Hudson said.
Courtney Mays, a stylist for Ms. Stewart who was also a creative consultant for the Liberty's Met Gala looks, buzzed around the room on Saturday, depositing Jimmy Choo heels here and silver cuff links there. She said the gala's closely watched carpet was an opportunity to show that 'to be a woman in sport can look so many different ways — and that is, in fact, dandy.'
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