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Can you believe it’s been 25 years since we lost the legendary Payne Stewart?

The impossibly popular American was having something of a career reneissance in 1999.

He had just ended a four-year wait for a tenth PGA Tour title when he added an 11th – and a third major championship – with that famous US Open win over Phil Mickelson.

A triumphant return to the Ryder Cup for the first time since 1993 was Stewart’s reward before his untimely death a few weeks later at the age of just 42.

But this is a celebration of his life and – in particular – his incredible wardrobe.

Stewart was hardly the first golfer to have an eccentric dress sense, and the likes of John Daly, Rickie Fowler and Bryson DeChambeau have ensured he certainly wasn’t the last. But one could argue that he was the most eye-catching.

With that traditional Ben Hogan-style flat cap, plus fours and long socks, it was never difficult to pick Stewart out of a crowd.

Here’s a small selection of our favourites…

• Want to get the Payne Stewart look? Check out this new apparel range

• What is the Payne Stewart Award and who has won it?

Payne Stewart outfits

Stewart rocked up to the 1984 Masters looking like he was heading straight to the prom after his round.

Who else could get away with bowling into Augusta wearing a white cuffed shirt and red tie combo? Fair play.

(Credit: Augusta National via Getty Images)

There are a million reasons to love this 1986 pic of Stewart. The outfit from head to toe is immaculate, but we can’t move on without mentioning that old-school launch monitor that looks more like that photocopier in the corner of your office that hasn’t worked for a decade.

(Credit: PGA Tour Archive via Getty Images)

The Green Jackets clearly had no problem with Stewart’s shirt and tie combo – because at the ’87 Masters he rocked this all red and white number which was just spiffy.

(Credit: Augusta National via Getty Images)

Stewart was a huge (American) football fan and if you’ve ever seen pictures of him with the NFL logo plastered all over his clothes, it’s because the governing body sponsored him for a lot of his career. (Now you understand the image at the very top of the page.)

Part of the deal was that, during any given PGA Tour event, he had to wear the colours of the nearest NFL team on the final day.

So, here he is hugging the Wanamaker Trophy, having just won his maiden major championship in 1989, at Kemper Lakes, Illinois, wearing a Chicago Bears cap…

(Credit: Getty Images)

It wasn’t just Augusta National where Stewart wanted to show off his eccentric threads. Fans at the Home of Golf for the 1990 Open Championship were treated to this rather dashing yellow and blue outfit.

If anyone who makes Team Europe’s Ryder Cup outfits is reading, we’ve got an idea…

(Credit: Allsport)

If you’re going to win your national championship for the first time, you best do it in your national colours.

Stewart edged Scott Simpson in a playoff at Hazeltine to lift the his second major title at the 1991 US Open.

(Credit: Allsport)

How could we not include this beauty? Stewart wore quartered-polo depicting the Union Flag at the 1992 Open Championship at Muirfield – complete with NFL and Lexus logos, of course.

(Credit: Allsport)

Here’s that NFL deal in full flow again, with Stewart playing the 1994 Kemper Open in Maryland wearing the burgundy, white and golf of the Washington Commanders (née Redskins).

(Credit: PGA Tour Archive via Getty Images)

Of course it wasn’t just his apparel that got full colour treatment. Look at these bad boys!

(No snakes were harmed in the making of these golf shoes.)

((As far as we know.))

(Credit: Allsport)

Even when he was dressed up in a shirt and tie, the flat cap was on his head. Here he is talking to the late, great Byron Nelson during the legend’s eponymous Classic in 1997…

(Credit: Allsport)

And finally, just to show that he didn’t always go down the flamboyant route, here’s Stewart during a PGA Championship practice round in 1999 wearing a “normal” polo shirt and cap.

It’s actually quite jarring to see him dressed like this…

(Credit: AFP via Getty Images)

But we can’t finish on that note! So here’s Stewart ending his eight-year wait for a third major championship at the 1999 US Open just months before he left us.

(Credit: Allsport)

What an image.

What a celebration.

What a golfer.

And what a man.


author headshot

Alex Perry is the Associate Editor of bunkered. A journalist for more than 20 years, he has been a golf industry stalwart for the majority of his career and, in a five-year spell at ESPN, covered every sporting event you can think of. He completed his own Grand Slam at the 2023 Masters, having fallen in love with the sport at his hometown club of Okehampton and on the links of nearby Bude & North Cornwall.

Associate Editor

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