It’s finally here; as the rest of the world is celebrating the turn of the calendar to 2025, the NHL will be staging its annual Winter Classic at Chicago’s Wrigley Field with the Chicago Blackhawks playing host to the St. Louis Blues this afternoon.
In this post, I’ll give you a rundown of all of the visual aspects of the game as the Blues and Blackhawks turn back the clock and celebrate the hockey styles of yesterday while flying around the ivy-lined rink. From each team’s uniforms to the logos for the game, the rink design and setup, and what the goalies will be wearing.
Let’s start with the main event…
2025 NHL WINTER CLASSIC UNIFORMS
The Blackhawks, wearing red, will again reach back into the wealth of options their ninety-eight-year-old wardrobe offers. St Louis, in cream, has had fewer unique uniform designs over the years (and has already used up their more prominent ones several times); because of this, they’re going away from their own franchise’s history a bit for their design.
SHOP: 2025 NHL Winter Classic Blues and Blackhawks jerseys available now
CHICAGO BLACKHAWKS 2025 WINTER CLASSIC UNIFORM
Starting with Chicago. We get the first time the Blackhawks have worn red for an outdoor game. Inspired by their uniforms and crests worn during the 1940s and ’50s, the Blackhawks will have several horizontal stripes across the chest in white and black with a mishmash of team logos as the main crest.
The current Blackhawks’ primary logo is the centrepiece inside a roundel with four stars around the bottom, a nod to the Chicago city flag. The typeface within the roundel is a block, serif-style font, which is very close to what the crest featured on their uniforms of the late ’40s/early ’50s. You’ll note that the team name was presented as two words in those original photos; the team made their name a single word in 1986. On the back of the jersey, the player numbers incorporate a pinstripe pattern, a nod to the Chicago Cubs (perfect for a game at Wrigley Field).
From 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 honours both the team’s storied past and the city’s broader
sporting legacy.
ST. LOUIS BLUES 2025 WINTER CLASSIC UNIFORM
The St Louis Blues design takes things back to the 1930s St. Louis Flyers, a team that predates the Blues’ time in the NHL by three decades. The striping across the chest, with the team name across it, is directly inspired by those Flyers uniforms. The colours blue and gold are not what the Flyers wore, but they, of course, are present here to tie this uniform to the Blues franchise.
The font for the ST LOUIS name across the chest is a modified version of a prototype Blues jersey from 1967, which had previously served as the inspiration for their Reverse Retro 2.0 uniform back in 2022-23. Something that caught my eye is a modified Bluenote logo on the shoulder, perhaps testing the waters for a future logo change.
From 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 honour the city of St. Louis.
New buckets!
We’re debuting a new STL logo on our helmets for the #WinterClassic this year.
You like? #stlblues pic.twitter.com/EiVpENs6Qa
— St. Louis Blues (@StLouisBlues) December 30, 2024
Jerseys can be purchased right now here
2025 NHL Winter Classic Logos
The 2025 NHL Winter Classic logo, of course, pays tribute to Wrigley Field’s iconic look — the main element is the red marquee that hangs outside the stadium above the main entrance, greeting fans entering the stadium. At the bottom of the logo, we see a series of bricks, a tribute to the brick outfield wall surrounding the playing field, and, of course, the green ivy that scales those walls. The host city of CHICAGO is noted at the bottom, flanked by Chicago stars. Familiar Winter Classic logo elements are present with snow, icicles, and the usual Winter Classic typeface.
You may notice that 2025 is missing from the Winter Classic branding this year. We can only assume this is because the game will be played during the 2024 calendar year (by only a few hours) on the evening of December 31, 2024. Though we aren’t hearing the new year anywhere in relation to the game now, when it was first announced earlier this year, the league specifically referred to it as the 2025 Winter Classic. As far as I’m concerned, that’s exactly what it is; I mean, by the time the game is in its third period, more than 3/4 of the planet will be going about life in the new year anyways.
Check out our full history of the NHL’s Winter Classic logos from 2008 to 2025
2025 Winter Classic Rink Setup
For each Winter Classic, the vast, otherwise empty playing surface surrounding the rink is spruced up. For this year’s game, the NHL drew inspiration from Chicago’s iconic landmarks. Designed in collaboration with Seattle-based Analog Heart, the set-up incorporates elements of the city’s bridge architecture, waterways, parks, and, of course, Wrigley Field’s signature brick and ivy-covered outfield walls.
The rink is placed at the center of Wrigley Field atop a representation of the frozen Chicago River. Park sidewalks and bridges will surround the rink. Behind the team benches, exposed areas of frozen water will feature, while the left field area will host a separate ice sheet with local youth hockey players.
In right field, a celebration for New Year’s Eve with revellers in formal black-tie attire toasting the arrival of 2025 and a farewell to 2024.
Wrigley Field has updated its famous manual green scoreboard to show the out-of-town NHL scores, with the multiple slots for nine innings converted to a more hockey-friendly three-period + overtime setup.
2025 Winter Classic Goalie Gear
One of the more underappreciated aspects of each Winter Classic game is the vintage-style goalie gear we’re treated to. Now, anyone who has seen what goalies wore back in the day would know that there’s really not much to discuss — designs are relatively plain and brown, as you can see from Peter Mrazek and Arvid Soderblom of Blackhawks above. Mrazek adding red stripes and Chicago’s secondary Winter Classic logo are certainly more modern touches, but the Blackhawks get double bonus points for the colander-style white pattern on their leather-brown-coloured blockers.
As for masks, Arvid Soderblom has a depiction of a vintage-style goalie mask painted onto the front of his modern cage in white (above, left). Petr Mrazek is going with a baseball theme, featuring the red stitching of a baseball and some Chicago Cubs player imagery on the sides.
The St. Louis Blues have gone a little more modern (relative to Chicago) with cream-coloured goalie equipment to match their sweaters for the game. Jordan Binnington has stayed with a fairly blank design with only a few blue and gold stripes in the corners of his equipment… Joel Hofer did not.
Binnington redeems the Blues goaltenders with this tribute to baseball’s St. Louis Cardinals, a little reference to the rivalry between the Cards and the usual residents of Wrigley Field, the Chicago Cubs.
Binnington’s mask features pencil-style sketches of some of the Cardinals more recent legendary players, Albert Pujols, Yadier Molina and Adam Wainwright, and the current St. Louis Cardinals logo on either side. An icicle-laden version of the St Louis Blues logo frames these drawings. A nod to Wrigley Field’s ivy and bricks are on the top.
The 2025 NHL Winter Classic game will get underway at 5 p.m. ET (4 p.m. Chicago-time) and will air on TNT in the U.S. as well as Sportsnet and TVAS in Canada.
Photos and graphics in this post are via SportsLogos.Net, Fanatics, the NHL, the St. Louis Blues, and the Chicago Blackhawks, unless otherwise noted.
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