“Victory Through Harmony,” It’s the Arsenal Way

London is filled to the brim with football clubs, both at the amateur level, all the way up to the Premier League with 17 professional sides — over half as many teams as in the MLS. Arguably none, however, have the support and fandom on a global scale as Arsenal FC. It’s been roughly 20 years now since the proud North London side has won the league, but the club has reemerged as a powerhouse, domestically and in Europe. And the fervor with the fans couldn’t be any stronger.

A proud Gooner doesn’t even have to travel to the Emirates to feel the roar. “Every time we come here, I’m blown away seeing how full the stadium is,” Adam Gardiner, Arsenal’s marketing director, tells Hypebeast before the club took on Manchester United in Los Angeles during its ongoing U.S. Tour. “Our American supporters have told us specifically that they don’t want an Americanized version of Arsenal. They want to touch and feel the fabric of North London when Arsenal are in town.” Last year, that sentiment translated into a bold highlighter yellow away kit that channeled the vibrancy of the London Borough of Islington. This time around, Arsenal wanted to celebrate the club’s proud connection to Africa and the African diaspora.

LABRUM London founder, Foday Dumbuya, a massive Arsenal fan himself, was tapped to lend his expertise on the new strip. Produced by adidas and set in a pan-African color palette, the shirt features red and green along the branding and Three Stripes, while a hand-drawn pattern adorns the side accents at the edge of the shirt — as well as in the lifestyle merchandise.

Born in Sierra Leone and having moved to London at age 12, Dumbuya was one of the many people enthralled by the success of Arsenal at an early age, as the club fielded numerous stars from Africa, including Lauren, Nwankwo Kanu, Kolo Touré and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, amongst others. “I think African fans gravitate to that because they can see themselves in those players,” Dumbuya told the New York Times. “It felt like a cultural celebration, rather than a kit launch,” Gardiner added.

“As a second-generation immigrant growing up in London, I watched some incredible Arsenal players with African heritage,” Dumbuya said in a statement. “These players were amazing role models to me, playing the game in a beautiful way, but also representing the wider community that I connect with. Arsenal as a club has such a strong connection to this community, so it is an incredibly proud moment for me to have collaborated on this design with them.”

Before the match against United, Arsenal brought a slice of home to Inglewood in the form of the famous club letters to its 3,000 attendee Fan Fest, which featured a Q+A with former team legends in Theo Walcott and Gilberto Silva, music by Glass Animals and celebrity appearances by fellow Gooner fans Justin Bieber, Will Poulter, and musicians Siobhan Bell, Mabel and Bas.

From Islington to Inglewood, Hypebeast was on the ground to speak with Gardiner before kickoff to discuss the new away shirt and learn more about how the club centers community at the core of its brand mission.

In today’s social media-driven landscape, players have become their own brands. How does Arsenal tap into that individualism, whilst maintaining its own unique brand image and history, within both the London market and amidst the global footballing powerhouses?

Great question. Our whole mindset is: One Club. Everyone who is associated: from staff, supporters to players — believe we’re all a part of the same family. What’s amazing about our men’s, women’s and academy players is that they evoke the same values and belief systems that we do as a brand.

Describe Arsenal’s brand pillars.

What we absolutely obsess over is putting our supporters at the heart of our creativity and that’s when we are at our best. We are at our best when we work together as one. Our purpose is: Arsenal acts for a winning team, winning culture and winning community. That, for us, is the most elegant manifestation of our club motto — which is ‘Victory through Harmony.’ That purpose: winning (victory), harmony (it’s not about winning at all costs) — it’s about when team, culture and community are harmonious in coming together. It’s about being on the front foot and driving change.

When it comes to our supporters, we have three values: always move forward, togetherness and actions that matter. We have a history of always doing the right thing and not about people to see what we’re doing, but doing the right thing because that’s what we believe as a football club.

Football clubs are founded on communities and we have a real responsibility to continuously stay true to that essence to which we were founded.

For those unfamiliar or outside of the UK, can you describe how Arsenal is one of the most community-oriented clubs in the Premier League?

We’re really proud of where we’re from and the dynamism of North London and Islington in particular, embodies what I just described. We continue to do a lot of research and what we’ve found is: supporters, no matter where you are in the world, you’re a North Londener — a Gooner. That spirit of North London shows up globally. I’ve just come from the Fan Zone and it’s amazing the apparel our U.S. supporters are wearing and them chanting ’North London Forever’, just shows the power of the brand. No matter where you are in the world, you can feel that connection to the club.

Can you walk us through the new away kit, from the inspirations behind the design to how the logo has been simplified on all the shirts?

We’re really privileged to have incredible partners and when we come together, we become greater than the sums of our parts. In many instances where we’ve worked together, we’re able to take the very best of our partners and the very best of Arsenal and go into new places together. That’s no different for the away kit.

Two years out from a launch, we come together with adidas and talk about what stories do we want to tell in two years time? What are the insights and things we are hearing from our supporters? Then we align on some key themes and that gets formalized into a creative brief for product design. To follow, it goes into rounds of reviews and eventually to market in several years time.

What was amazing about the process of the away kit this time, we tapped into our Creator’s Club — where we invited local photographers to document our match day — from supporters arriving to the game itself. We platform that on our channels to give them an audience that perhaps they wouldn’t be able to have on their own. It’s a similar notion with the away kit: our rich cultural heritage with Africa and the players that have come through. We love the notion that, ‘When people move, culture moves forward.’ It just felt like the right time to bring that story to life.

LABRUM London, an amazing designer who’s on an incredible trajectory, but who is still at the start of their journey, made us think what a great time it would be to collaborate with Foday [Dumbuya], the designer of the brand to tell the story of our rich connection to Africa. How can we interpret that to create something really special for our supporters? Foday is also a huge Arsenal supporter. It felt like a cultural celebration, rather than a kit launch.

Do you ever bring in past or current players to have input on the design of new collections or kits?

We do have consultations. We’re obviously privileged to have a lot of former players who work at the club — from Edu to Per Mertesacker to Mikel Arteta. For us, it’s about: at the right moments and the right times, who do we bring into that creative process to make sure we are doing our very best? A great example of that is Foday, a passionate supporter, who was tapped to create the kit.

Is the U.S. audience your biggest fanbase outside the UK?

We have an amazing community here in the U.S. Every time we come here, I’m blown away seeing how full the stadium is and just the supporters event as well. It’s just incredible the passion, the connection to the club and North London is really special.

Does Arsenal utilize specific narratives or strategies when engaging with its U.S. fanbase?

Absolutely. Our American supporters have told us specifically that they don’t want an Americanized version of Arsenal. They want to touch and feel the fabric of North London when Arsenal are in town.

The Women’s game is finally, rightfully, being invested in en masse. Can you talk about how Arsenal prioritizes it?

Absolutely. The women’s game has been a priority for Arsenal since 1985, so there’s a strong trajectory now, but something the club has always seen importance in. We were the first women’s professional team in the UK, so that heritage has always been in our DNA. We’re one of the few, if not only clubs, that our touring in the U.S. with both clubs and activating in the exact same places in the exact same way.

The goal on the pitch is to obviously win the league and the Champions League. How about off it? What are some of the larger marketing goals Arsenal aims to achieve? Can you walk us through some of the creative projects and narratives the club is working on?

We’re in such a great place as a club with the momentum that we have, both on the pitch with the men’s and women’s teams and off it. We have such a clear strategy and vision. Everyone in the club is subscribed to that vision: how do we, collectively as a club, contribute to winning trophies and build the sentiment within our supporters, players and staff?

The club’s first brand strategy started three years ago and we will continue to fuel the desirability of the team through creative work. We were honored to win a D&AD Award for our work a few months back for the 23/24 third kit.

Women’s is also a huge focus for us and we’ve got an amazing heritage in the women’s game, as we’ve been there for 40 years. It’s something we are absolutely focused and driven on to grow the game sustainably. We’re moving from six games at the Emirates this year to eleven and we want to have more and more.

Whoever you are and however you’re connected to with Arsenal, you feel like you belong. From Pride to a moment we have next month called “Black Arsenal” and the contributions that Arsenal have made to the Black community over the last few decades. The away kit is about the African diaspora and trying to forever ensure our supporters belong. In order to put our fans at the heart of everything we do, we need to understand them.