Opening her inbox this past summer, Melissa Francis couldn’t believe her eyes.
Inside, the local artist found a surprise message from the Nashville Predators inviting her to create a one-of-a-kind jersey for the team’s Asian & Pacific Islander Heritage Night on Wednesday, Jan. 29.
Francis, who rekindled her passion for art and design into a full-time job the same year the Predators reached the Stanley Cup Final, accepted the challenge.
“I always did like to draw when I was a kid, and I would craft, do clay and crochet and cross stitch, just anything I could get my hands on. I loved creating, but as a teenager, I was always told you can't do anything with art, that there's no career for it and I stopped until I was 26,” Francis said. “So, it’s very surreal right now. It's hard to wrap my head around it. When we're there for the game that night, it's just going to be incredible to see my art everywhere. I went from giving it up completely for 10 years to now seeing it in my city.”
The proud daughter of a Chinese mother and an American father, Francis’ artwork is heavily inspired by her own heritage and upbringing.
That inspiration is of course featured prominently in her design for this year’s API Heritage Night jersey, which reimagines the iconic Pred Head into a Japanese anime style, complete with a lively sparkling eye, white and Gold lotus flowers and stylized clouds.
Underneath the jersey’s central crest is a snake symbolizing the Chinese Lunar New Year, which falls on the same day Francis’ jersey will be introduced to Smashville.
“The lotus flower appears in a lot of cultures - Korean, Chinese, Japanese - and it also represents love, hope, humanity and change,” Francis said. “I put that on both the snake and the Pred Head to tie those two things together.
“Then in a lot of Asian artwork, they’ll have clouds that don't look like clouds, but that kind of give that effect. It's not specifically Chinese or Japanese, but you'll see it a lot. And I thought if I put it on the Pred Head as well, instead of the stripes, it would pull it together with the background. Clouds also represent hope, change and good fortune.”
Francis’ design additionally follows the Predators’ Music City theme for the 2024-25 season by placing a pipa, the traditional Chinese string instrument, underneath the jersey’s primary logo and replacing the guitar pick shoulder patch with a drum, an instrument found throughout numerous Asian cultures.
“The pipa is the instrument I initially started with, because with Nashville, the guitar is the recognizable string instrument,” Francis said. “I was thinking, ‘What is an Asian string instrument that's also recognizable?’... And then I went with drums, because drums are prominent in almost, if not every, Asian culture.”
Another element pulled from Asian culture is the combination of the design’s two central hues: red and gold.
“Red and gold together, specifically, represents good fortune, prosperity and joy,” Francis said. “During Chinese New Year, they give red envelopes. I don't know too much about my Chinese culture, but my mom used to give me a red envelope every Chinese New Year with money in it. It's just a way to start the new year on a good note.”
Fans attending Wednesday’s game can start the new year on a good note, too.
For starters, the first 10,000 fans through the doors at Bridgestone Arena will receive a mini vinyl record coaster featuring the design. Fans can also bid on the player-signed jerseys through the Predators Foundation Silent Auction by texting PREDS to 76278.
In addition to API Heritage, the Predators are set to celebrate one final Music Heritage Night in 2024-25, with a Black Music Heritage celebration set for Saturday, Feb. 8.
Click here to learn more about each Music Heritage Night.