From "What pants are in style now? You won’t like the answer. Barrel-leg pants, balloon pants, capri pants, track pants and sweatpant jeans are all vying for your attention — and breaking your brain" (WaPo)(gift link, so you can see the pants (and not try to box me in by what's more normative when I'm out and about in my balloon pants).
April 25, 2026
"We have recently crossed some sort of undeniable threshold, a point of no return in pants-wearing: An Event Horizon of pants."
"Seemingly all pants are in style, which, conversely, means no pants are in style. (Also, literally, pantslessness is in style, according to the no-pants trend seen on runways and red carpets.) We have achieved pants singularity.... 'Social media has decentralized trend authority, allowing multiple fits — from low-rise baggy to capris to short shorts — to gain traction simultaneously,' says Laura Yiannakou, womenswear senior strategist.... 'Sculptural shapes such as balloon and barrel pants also perform strongly in visual environments.'... 'Personally, I think it’s great that there’s not one dominant silhouette,' says [fashion historian Sonya] Abrego, 'because it allows people to have more choice and feel less boxed in by what’s more normative.'"
From "What pants are in style now? You won’t like the answer. Barrel-leg pants, balloon pants, capri pants, track pants and sweatpant jeans are all vying for your attention — and breaking your brain" (WaPo)(gift link, so you can see the pants (and not try to box me in by what's more normative when I'm out and about in my balloon pants).
From "What pants are in style now? You won’t like the answer. Barrel-leg pants, balloon pants, capri pants, track pants and sweatpant jeans are all vying for your attention — and breaking your brain" (WaPo)(gift link, so you can see the pants (and not try to box me in by what's more normative when I'm out and about in my balloon pants).
Posts
30 comments:
NFW am I booking summer airline travel now…
"Women were expected to wear dresses into the early 70s" says some WaPo commenator. That would comes as news to Mary Tyler Moore. I also have pictures of my mother from the mid-60s wearing pants.
Of course, she may be right. The Cruel patriarchy is always dictating women's fashions. As if men have any say over what women wear. LOL.
Balloon pants look like a good way to hide your fat or unsightly legs. Maybe Lena Dunham wears them.
I’m just grateful those 80s harem pants haven’t become a ubiquitous trend…
I'm just glad skinny jeans have been and gone. I got tired of feeling so constructed.
OTOH, the wide-leg style looks a lot better on the straight-up-snd-down body than on the curvy body. It's not stopping me from wearing them - they're comfy, and I have a pair of lightweight denim high-waist wide-leg jeans that always make me feel like Valerie Bertinelli in One Day At A Time, which is fun - but I am not blind to the fact that this style makes my boyishly shaped cousin look elfin and me look... less so, shall we say.
Now that we're doing the full-time travel thing, with our car as the current limit on our luggage but headed toward a large backpack apiece in the fall when we will be in Europe, my jeans wardrobe is dwindling. I think I started with about six pairs when we sold our house last September; I'm down to two, and I'm wondering if any will make the cut for Europe - they're so (comparatively) heavy and hard to wash.
Oh No! It's a Crisis of Choices! Whatever Shall We Do!?
Step one: Don't take fashion direction from gay urban men.
After a quick perusal I saw no mention of Nordstrom's "Fake Mud" jeans.
And then after hearing the ai narration, I realized this is all about women pants.
Extra Credit for using "behooves" in a Style piece about pants.
A beautiful woman can wear anything, no matter how outrageous or ridiculous, or nothing at all.
The rest of us...
Every woman my age has bought as many wide leg pants as possible as soon as they became available again. Sorry, not confused.
“Based on recent outings, tight stretch pants with a muffin top rolling over are still in style.”
This comment from the WaPo comment section made me laugh.
I go out of my way to avoid fashion trends.
Unless you are a teen, it's a clown show for women.
Aren’t barrel pants a genuinely new style? They were mentioned but not highlighted. From what I’ve seen they look good on a variety of body types.
A thing I wish I could banish from public life: the pseudo-pantslessness of women wearing leggings the approximate color of their skin.
Now, see, Jamie. I have a completely different take on this.
women wearing leggings the approximate color of their skin
Skinwalkers.
Unless , of course Jamie they are one of those majority that are part of "Rusty's rule of Lycra, piercings and tattoos."
Just wearing tights has been a thing for women for a while. I got trouble for calling one of the early adopters "the pantless wonder" behind her back
Just wear what you are most comfortable in and appropriate for the setting. You’ll feel more confident.
I always take a pair of parachute pants with me in case my balloon pants have an accident. O, the humanity!
But will Carhartt's start making real blue jeans for working men again, or is the world stuck with stretchy skinny leg Eurotrash hip huggers from now on?
Jamie: “ the pseudo-pantslessness of women wearing leggings the approximate color of their skin.”
Yes, I am always shocked by this in the gym. For a split second I think she either wandered out of the ladies’ locker room or I wandered into it. CC, JSM
Aggie: But will Carhartt's start making real blue jeans for working men again, or is the world stuck with stretchy skinny leg Eurotrash hip huggers from now on?
In case you are serious, take a look at All American Clothing.
Is Pants a plural noun ? What is the singular and how is it used?
Additionally, in the context of, say, summer camp hijinx, I recall pants being used as a transitive verb.
I saw a man in in shorts there!
But, he was at the beach. Is that OK?
“Seemingly all pants are in style, which, conversely, means no pants are in style.“
And by the contrapositive, if it is not in style, then seemingly it is not pants.
This makes me think of the Arcade Fire song No Cars Go.
I wanna go where no pants go....
https://youtu.be/uxwF9bx_t1k?si=Dav4hT3dpTgRJIAk
CC, JSM
AI plies its hand at FI (Fashion Influencer). Will AI follow?
Bring back Zubaz
Post a Comment
Please use the comments forum to respond to the post. Don't fight with each other. Be substantive... or interesting... or funny. Comments should go up immediately... unless you're commenting on a post older than 4 days. Then you have to wait for us to moderate you through. It's also possible to get shunted into spam by the machine. We try to keep an eye on that and release the miscaught good stuff. We do delete some comments, but not for viewpoint... for bad faith.