There are perhaps five colours in world football that belong to one club, and sky blue is one of them. Say the words and the mind goes straight to east Manchester. That was not inevitable. For most of the twentieth century Manchester City were the other club in the city, and their shirt was a regional colour rather than a global one. The story of how the Manchester City shirt became a brand recognised on every continent is a story about money, certainly, but also about a decision made in the 1890s and a goal scored in the 93rd minute in 2012.
St Mark’s, Ardwick and the choice of blue
The club began in 1880 as St Mark’s, a church team in West Gorton, became Ardwick AFC in 1887 and took the name Manchester City in 1894. It was around that reorganisation that sky blue was settled on as the home colour, with white shorts. Nobody recorded why. Theories range from a Freemasons’ connection to the colour of a local benefactor’s racing silks, and none has been proven. What is certain is that the choice stuck: City have worn sky blue at home for more than 130 years, and the shade has drifted lighter and darker with the fashions of each decade without ever leaving.
Maine Road and the first golden age
City moved to Maine Road in 1923 and won their first league title there in 1937, wearing plain sky blue with a white collar. The shirt everyone remembers from that ground, though, is the one worn between 1966 and 1970 by Joe Mercer and Malcolm Allison’s team: Colin Bell, Francis Lee, Mike Summerbee and Tony Book. They won the league in 1968, the FA Cup in 1969 and the League Cup and European Cup Winners’ Cup in 1970, and they did it in a shirt so simple, sky blue, white crew neck, no manufacturer logo, no sponsor, that it is still the template for the club’s retro range.
The wilderness in Kappa and Le Coq Sportif
For the next thirty years the shirt was worn through decline. Umbro made the kits through the 1970s and 1980s, Saab, Philips and Brother took turns on the front, and the club fell as far as the third tier in 1998. The kits of that era have a loyal following precisely because of what they were worn for: the Kappa shirt of 1997 to 1999, baggy and slightly ridiculous, is remembered for Georgi Kinkladze and for the 1999 play-off final against Gillingham, when Paul Dickov’s late equaliser started the climb back. Le Coq Sportif and Reebok followed as City moved from Maine Road to the City of Manchester Stadium in 2003.
2008: the shirt changes meaning
The Abu Dhabi takeover in September 2008 changed everything about the club, including what its shirt represented. Within a year Etihad Airways was on the front, where it remains, and the stadium carried the same name. Umbro returned in 2009 and produced the shirt worn for the 2011 FA Cup, the club’s first trophy in 35 years, and then the one worn on 13 May 2012, when Sergio Agüero scored against QPR at 93 minutes and 20 seconds to win the Premier League on goal difference from Manchester United. That plain sky blue Umbro shirt with the Etihad logo is now the most collected City design of all.
Nike, Guardiola and the years of records
Nike made the kits from 2013 to 2019, covering the titles of 2014 and 2018. The second of those, Pep Guardiola’s first, was the 100-point season, and the shirt worn for it, sky blue with a white collar, has become the visual shorthand for the Guardiola era. Guardiola arrived in 2016 and has since won the league six times, including four in a row from 2021 to 2024, and the 2023 treble, completed with Rodri’s goal against Inter in Istanbul.
Puma and the modern shirt
Puma took over in 2019 on one of the largest kit deals in the sport and has used the City shirt as a design laboratory ever since, with home kits inspired by Manchester’s music scene, its industrial past and, more than once, the 1968 team. The 2025/26 season ended without the title, Arsenal winning it by four points, but with both domestic cups: City beat Arsenal in the League Cup final and Chelsea in the FA Cup final.
For 2026/27 Puma has produced the most distinctive home shirt of the era. The colour runs through a full gradient, darker sky blue at the shoulders lightening towards the hem, with the crest and sponsor in a metallic monochrome finish. The phrase “Not Your Typical City” is printed inside the collar, the campaign featured Guardiola and Erling Haaland, and the player version uses Puma’s ULTRAWEAVE fabric. The away shirt is black and yellow with a bee pattern, the symbol of Manchester. Both have been well received, and at £85 the replica sits in line with the other top clubs.
The red and black stripes
City’s most unexpected kit was worn for two of its most important matches. Malcolm Allison believed a striped kit looked more intimidating and more European, so for the 1969 FA Cup final against Leicester and the 1970 Cup Winners’ Cup final against Górnik Zabrze in Vienna, City wore red and black stripes rather than sky blue, and won both. The design has been revived as an away or third kit in almost every era since, and Puma’s versions have been among the best-selling change shirts in the club’s history. It is the one City kit that a neutral might not recognise, and the one that supporters of a certain age love most.
Tiers, prices and what the money buys
The 2026/27 home shirt is sold in two versions, as most kits now are. The authentic shirt, in Puma’s ULTRAWEAVE fabric with a slim cut and heat-bonded crest, is priced above £110; the replica, in the brand’s recycled RE:FIBRE material with a looser fit and an embroidered crest, is £85. The gradient, the crest and the collar are identical on both. Supporters who want the shirt for the stands rather than the pitch will notice no difference beyond the price, and the cheaper fan-version copies sold by independent retailers reproduce the gradient reasonably well, which was not always true of subtler designs.
Why the colour works
City’s colour has one enormous advantage over the reds and whites that surround it: almost nobody else at the top of the game wears it. Sky blue is rare enough in elite football that the shirt is identifiable at a glance in any stadium, any highlights package and any shop window. That is worth more to a global brand than any design flourish, and it explains why every Puma experiment, however bold, has kept the base colour untouched.
The 1894 decision nobody can explain turned out to be the best branding choice in the club’s history. Everything since, the takeover, the trophies, the gradient, has simply been built on top of it. For more on football kit design, colour and history, explore the Kit section on Science & Football.