It’s been a while since we had an FKF so we may as well go for something that is likely to hit the spot.
Essentially, we have gone for a world where, instead of partnering with Umbro after the end of a fruitful period with adidas, Luton Town had joined up with Hummel instead.
The logic employed doesn’t pretend to be deeply insightful or galaxy-brained – Luton were going well in the mid-to-late 1980s and so were Hummel; the mix of the Hatters’ palette and the available designs from the Danish firm should be at almost can’t-miss levels.
The home takes the design used for Tottenham Hotspur’s away and third, utilising dual-colour diagonal pinstripes.
Then, for the second and third, it would have been bordering on negligence not to repurpose Danish Dynamite as Bedfordshire Bangers – Luton had to have royal blue rather than navy for their third kits in the 1980s due to Football Association rules around the use of navy and black so as to avoid clashes with match officials (though, oddly, that Hummel Tottenham third kit was navy, which is perhaps why it was hardly used).
As always, feedback is welcome, along with requests for future FKFs – comment below or get in touch via Twitter, Bluesky or Facebook.
I’d have ret-conned the chronological timeframe for these particular designs and gone with “switched to Hummel in 1987 after leaving adidas early) from looking at the designs, though absolutely truly magnificent they are 😊
Hummel by 1989 had started streamlining their designs somewhat, with the “HUMMEL” repeated background fabric, or shadow chevron pattern (like Aston Villa and Southampton away kits of 1989/90, when Luton switched to Umbro after being with adidas). Hummel started using a double chevron branding on the sleeves instead of the continuous pattern. I think by 1989/90 only Wimbledon and Sunderland were using this style having carried forward their 1988/89 kits.
But still, fabulous kits. Still kinda odd seeing Luton in orange these days as I grew up with them in white and navy, or white and black.
Two of my formative years favourites perfectly encapsulated… I have both the (original) orange Luton shirt and the Danish home (a modern replica) , and would never have dreamed of combining them – until I see it in glorious Technicolour. Superb work!
These are brilliant designs and Jon, above, is right about the template Hummel were using at the time Luton switched from Adidas to Umbro for the 89-90 season. However, I will also add that whilst it has often been officially orange as the away and blue as the 3rd, the reality was different. Unlike these days when away kits are seemingly worn whenever possible, back in those days home colours were typically worn away and only away colours when the home kit clashed. As such it was relatively easy to predict what kit your team would be wearing away at any game. So, Luton wore white away from home most weeks but when that clashed the first choice was actually blue rather than orange. This is evidenced by the wearing of blue at places such as Leeds, Spurs, and Derby when they could, in theory, have worn orange or blue, but always wore blue on those occasions (before blue was formally ditched after 90/91 season then resurrected for one game in May 92). As such orange was reserved for clubs that wore both blue and white such as, Sheff Wed and QPR. At Man City and Coventry Luton wore white or orange presumably depending on the shade of pale blue that the home side were wearing. But when Coventry wore stripes, Luton wore orange. Sorry, to be such a geek about this, but also see the Luton Town – the Umbro years on this website: https://museumofjerseys.com/2021/01/24/luton-town-the-umbro-years-part-1-1989-92/