The best pants, the only pants
A few years ago, I was in an Aritzia and saw a pair of shorts that were a madeleine dipped in tisane situation: carpenter shorts, navy with white stitching. Why did I not buy them? I guess because that type of shorts isn’t really my look, or maybe I was in a looking-not-buying mode. Whatever. The point is that I eventually realized that the shorts come in a full-length version and that these were what I wanted.
But I didn’t want them enough to justify $98, nor—crucially—did the store have them in the right colors, in stores or online. They once did, which meant it existed. So I tried them on in store to get a sense of my size and did a spot of Poshmark research and found…
These were it. The perfect pants. Yes they had to be hemmed but they were it. 1996 distilled into pants. They don’t look like an updated version of the real thing. They’re 100% cotton and midrise and just correct. Not so workwear that it looks like a costume or like you’re culturally appropriating someone in one of the blue-collar but better-renumerated professions, but enough that you’re a bit fashion. Cargo pants I don’t get, but carpenter, absolutely. Like the bottom part of overalls.
.I realized that pants this good needed to be owned in an additional color. So I tried to figure out what I like that’s absent from my wardrobe and ended up with these, in a size smaller than the black/navy ones.
Between the waistband snugness and the impracticality of the color these are getting yeah less wear than the others but are arguably the more flattering ones. The details are more subtle, and I can’t decide if this is a good or bad thing.
Here is where it gets wild.
In the year 1702, I had a skirt I loved. A kilt-style camoflage deal by Tripp NYC. I can’t explain it in words but it had exactly the right print. I found something like it on an L.L. Bean zip tote, which I got in I think 2016 and continues to get a lot of use. But clothing, this seemed trickier. I am 40 and cannot pull off a camo miniskirt. Not, at least, one that is for a 9th grader.
But wait wait wait! They make The Pants in the print!
At least it seemed that they once did. Not new, at least. But these would appear periodically on Poshmark and the like and then turn out not to exist. I tried to order them twice, as in from two different sellers, and zilch. Not scams, just… before I could get the pants it did not work out.
Then there they were. In a size up from the original pair, but I figured that was swingable and, depending size of lunch or whatever, preferable.
Are these it? I’d say they’re more like it-adjacent. It’s still the Lafayette Street streetwear circa 1996 quality, or maybe something exclusive and Japanese, but also, the pants themselves are quite faded, in ways that the description and photo did not indicate. I am not going to pan the pants, however. I am not going to review them as if I were Lauren Oyler reviewing someone else or someone else reviewing Lauren Oyler. They’re close enough, enough to invest in having them hemmed, which I did, and you’ll never guess what I’m wearing right now.
Anyway I think I’m at capacity for these. I think the collection is complete. Also that all my other pants now look wrong and I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do with them.