The Chicago Blackhawks and St. Louis Blues, this year’s participants in the annual NHL “Winter Classic,” have officially unveiled the uniforms they’ll be wearing for the 2025 game. This year’s game will be played at Wrigley Field, with Chicago as the home team, and will actually take place on New Year’s Eve (December 31st), so technically the 2025 Winter Classic will be played in 2024.
We’ll start with the videos:
Proudly representing our city and its hockey heritage. St. Louis, our #WinterClassic sweater is for you. pic.twitter.com/5AJebFi4rI
— St. Louis Blues (@StLouisBlues) November 20, 2024
History is woven into the design of this year’s Winter Classic uniforms for the @NHLBlackhawks and @StLouisBlues #NHL #Blackhawks #Blues #WinterClassic pic.twitter.com/55RApOdBq9
— Fanatics (@Fanatics) November 20, 2024
With the Blackhawks as the home team, they’ll wear dark sweaters. Both the Blues and Blackhawks uniforms are “throwback inspired,” which we usually refer to as “fauxbacks.” Let’s take a look now.
St. Louis Blues
According to the NHL,
The Blues’ NHL Winter Classic uniform pays homage to the city’s hockey heritage. The jersey’s primary wordmark represents the first time in team history that a Blue Note is not the principal design element appearing on the chest. The font styling and numbers are inspired by an unworn prototype Blues uniform from 1966, and the jersey also includes a newly designed vintage-style “Blue Note” on the shoulder. Lastly, fleur-de-lis designs are featured on the inside back neck and hem loop labels to honor the city of St. Louis.
The front of the sweater is relatively simple. There are three horizontal stripes of gold, with a wordmark that reads “St. Louis” in gold lettering outlined in white, atop a thick solid blue stripe. That gold/white/blue/white/gold striping pattern is repeated on the jersey sleeves. The jersey hem is blue.
The back of the collar is blue, but as it moves toward the front of the jersey, it breaks down into cream with a blue stripe above the NHL shield.
The right shoulder features the 2025 Winter Classic logo patch, while the left shoulder has the Blues’ classic “Note” logo.
Some additional details can be seen here:
The rear of the uniform is similarly plain. Because this is an outdoor game, the NOB and rear number are both oversized.
Shorts are blue, with a cream and gold stripe, and sleeves also have oversized TV numbers. Socks are white, with a gold/white/blue/white/gold striping pattern like that on the sleeves.
Chicago Blackhawks
According to the NHL,
The Blackhawks’ NHL Winter Classic uniform pays homage to the franchise’s rich heritage while introducing distinctive new design elements. The jersey features a classic lace-neck collar, reminiscent of hockey’s early days, complemented by a vintage cream color that captures the nostalgic spirit of the Original Six era. In unique design flourishes, the front crest includes stars from the Chicago flag and the back numbers incorporate subtle pinstripes, a thoughtful tribute to Chicago’s deep baseball tradition. The elements come together to create a uniform that honors both the team’s storied past and the city’s broader sporting legacy.
Chicago will wear black helmets, red jerseys and black breezers.
Jerseys have a thick black collar, with a thin white stripe. The red jersey is bisected with white/black/white/black/white stripes running horizonatally across the chest. This pattern is repeated on the sleeves.
TV numbers are oversized and located above the stripes. The team’s secondary logo, with updated colors, is located atop the stripes, which a modernized crest is located in the center of the jersey.
The Winter Classic logo patch sits atop the right shoulder.
Breezers are black and will have a new “Chicago” script logo on the right leg. Socks are red, with a white/black/white/black/white striping pattern that is also on the sleeves.
Although the team didn’t provide a view of the rear of the jersey, I was able to go to the Fanatics page which contains the following graphic, in which you can see the “subtle” stripes running vertically down the numbers.
Both jerseys feature special details including city-specific elements in the necklines, and helmets, and the “NHL Winter Classic” designation on the bottom hem.
While I’ll need to see both of these on the ice and in action, I like what I see so far. The NHL and the teams who play in the Winter Classic generally do an excellent job with the uniforms they create for the game. It’s always one of the nicest looking games of the season, especially since the game is outdoors. Depending on the weather (and we’ve had everything from heavy snow to warm weather forcing delays due to ice conditions), players and coaches often will wear gear (like toques and scarves) that we’d never see indoors.
The Winter Classic continues the tradition the League established in 2008 of hosting a regular-season outdoor game at the onset of the new year. The game will be the 16th NHL Winter Classic and the 42nd NHL regular-season outdoor game. With so many games over the years, the NHL has tried to keep the Winter Classic uniforms traditional, while the other outdoor games — dubbed the “Stadium Series” — tend to have uniforms with a “modern” look and feel.
It’s actually a bit surprising this is only the second time Wrigley Field will be hosting the WC. The Hawks lost to the Detroit Red Wings in 2009. The Blues head into the matchup with a 2-0-0 record in outdoor games, while the Blackhawks are 1-5-0. The Hawks last won outdoors in 2014, when the team defeated the Pittsburgh Penguins at Soldier Field.
Readers? What do you think of this year’s Winter Classic uniforms?
They look good-ish. About what I expected. Hopefully they keep it ad free. Keep the clean look on the front.
Good-ish feels about right to me. I’d grade these C-plus for the Blues, B for Chicago. They’re highly OK! But the league average for outdoor-game uniforms is more like A-plus, so these both seem like disappointments to me.
Blues really screwed the pooch
I love St. Louis’s colours but that jersey is very uninspired. Chicago’s uni is very nice.
This is in the running for worst jersey in Blues history:
1. Red Reverse Retro
2. Yellow Reverse Retro
3. 2024 Winter classic
4. 2008-16 Navy Alt.
It looks like something a made for TV move team would use. The number font is horrid. They even dumbed down the glove colors from what they use with the throwback alts.
Thank you on the 08-16 Alt. That thing was dull, depressing, borings-ville, with a cartoony Arch logo. Hated it.
Never got the love for it either. Roundel logo, copperplate font, dull colors. Glad the present ownership group abandoned it.
Wish the Blues uni had a bit of the yellow/blue on the front of the collar, but other than that, they’re fine
I will say that the collar treatment on Chicago’s is actually not bad, considering the collar design is aesthetic garbage to begin with. They actually filled in the NHL shield panel, something I haven’t seen done on a single lace-up collar before now, and it actually looks halfway decent.
The Blues having the half-assed collar coloring is an additional layer of disappointment, though.
I take that back – I forgot the Rangers do fill in that panel as red to match the red collars on their white jerseys… but they also fill it red to clash with the blue collars on their blue jerseys.
More off-white. Still not a fan. It only kinda looks okay to me next to yellow, and only as an accent – see the 2010 Bruins’ Winter Classic jerseys or the Sabres’ 40th anniversary jerseys. As a base jersey color, no thank you.
As a life long Blues fan… meh.
Boring.
No real connection to the past.
It could be WAY worse, but that doesn’t make these good.
Hawks look is classic. Finally a red sweater. Although, they could have done without that Chicago script on the breezers.
What I find interesting is that the ad patches are not on the preview. I would imagine, these will be there on game day.
Interesting that they have not marketed this as the 2025 game. Even the logo patch makes no reference to the year or date.
That’s because it’s on New Year’s Eve, December 31st, 2024, so the NHL is downplaying the year.
The Blues’ sweater appears to be a nod to the St. Louis Flyers team. A little boring, maybe, but its not totally out of left field.
link
Thanks, Steve V…
I’ve never heard of the Flyers hockey club before, but clearly they were legit & established in St. Louis into the ‘60s.
Maybe that’s what happens when you were born in the ‘60s! LOL
Is there a close up of the subtle pinstripes on the back numbers?
nevermind, found it on the fanatics website.
Yes. I had actually downloaded a graphic from Fanatics (team didn’t show the back of the uni), but forgot to add it, and it shows the stripes (now added to post).
If you don’t want to scroll back up, click here: link
I much prefer Chicago in a black uni. The red one is fine for this event though. Any reason given why they’re not playing on Jan 1?
Absolutely love the Blues without the navy, but that’s pretty boring.
I just don’t think I can get behind any Blues jersey without the blue-note front and center. It’s too good of a logo to not have as the crest. The colors are great, though, and I like the stripes, but the blue note should be the focus.
The hawks uni is pretty good. The stripes are terrific, but I’d prefer to have the more colorful version of that “C” alternate logo
The Blues uni look good. They went for something different and still classy looking and I think they succeeded. I do wish the fleur-de-lis was incorporated in a more visible way. But I think this is a good one-off uniform.
The uniforms are OK, but I can think of 30 other NHL teams I’d rather watch on a national broadcast than these lame squads. NHL has an unrelenting hard-on for Connor Bedard.
A bit meh. But still light years ahead of what’s coming out of the NBA or NFL these days.
The Blackhawks uniforms legacy of the most attractive designs in sports continues.
As the Ferrari of uniform designs the most recent version doesn’t disappoint.
Has a nice retro blend mashup and the faux leather gloves only enhance that feeling.
LOGOMAN Grade: A++
The Blues jersey, even if it is based on an old St. Louis club, or an early Blues prototype design, falls flat for me. I’d like to see a fauxback Blues jersey with the classic diagonal front lettering like Pittsburgh has done or the classic Rangers look. Since the Penguins, Hurricanes, Avalanche, NHL All-Star Game jerseys and numerous international and college teams have used the diagonal cresting, then the Rangers don’t get exclusive rights to it and “St. Louis” in an italicised and drop shadowed font done in the right team color combination could look awesome and shout “old time hockey” the way they like their Winter Classic jerseys to look.