The other day, I had a revelation. Though it didn’t involve me running out of a bathtub naked yelling “Eureka!” because I had just discovered that the volume of objects is displaced in water, I could argue it was equally Earth shattering. I don’t look good in skinny jeans.
That’s crazy, right? Everyone looks good in skinny jeans! I once thought that too, going so far as to wear skin-tight, high-waisted American Apparel riding pants and disco pants almost every day. In fact, I can barely remember what life was like before I discovered skinny jeans. I have vague memories of wearing flare pants that were tight on the ass but could hide several small rodents under the hem, (not to mention waistlines so low they exposed your thong when you bent over) but those were back in my high school days, of which the memories have become pleasantly hazy over the years.
Finding skinny jeans was like discovering a new religion, one I have stayed entirely faithful to, despite the occasional dalliance with mom jeans. But these days, I have found myself particularly attracted to a trouser silhouette. For lack of a better word: man pants. I have acquired a few pairs of man pants and they run the gamut from slim and trim to nice and roomy. The only thing they have in common is that they are all high waisted (a necessary element for my lifestyle choices) and make me feel like a fancy, professional adult. This is important to me because I just graduated university and I am just really hoping to find a non-retail job willing to pay me. Wearing trousers makes me feel like I deserve to be paid more than minimum wage.
The trick to man pants is not to pick them straight off the men’s rack in the thrift store — those things aren’t designed to fit ample hips and ass — but to scour through the ladies workwear section. If you find a pair that fits in the waist but is a little too roomy in the leg, go forth to a tailor because you should never let a good fit go. Luckily, they’re pretty easy to find because I might be the only person in the world who is seriously into this look. Man pants make me look like cute, gamine Annie Hall throwback to the 1970s and if that is at all a bad thing, you can meet me at the flagpole during recess and we’ll fight about it.
Overall, I think a lot of people are into skinny jeans over weird pants because the former option seems like it is more “flattering.” The thing is, “flattering” can mean vastly different things to different people. I have undeniably gained weight in the past year and find my body is taking on a more “womanly” shape (in this case, womanly means thick hips and ass). I know that nobody cares when a skinny bitch gains weight and everyone keeps telling me that fat asses are hot, but at this point in my life where I have not 100% grown to love the shape I have become, I am most comfortable wearing bottoms with a little extra room for dat booty.
There is nothing inherently wrong with flattering your figure, but I feel like the media and fashion machines put way too much of an emphasis on wearing stuff that will supposedly make you look good. Frankly, I long to live in the radical sort of world where everyone can wear what they want without worrying about how they look or how other people will react to it. Perhaps in that sort of a world a lot more people would be wearing sweatpants, which is not exactly what I envisioned but hey, they’re comfortable so who cares, right? Fuck flattery!
Not to mention, I am also obsessed with the tag in my plaid trouser man pants. For me? Shucks, you don’t say!
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Isabel Slone is a Toronto-based fashion blogger and writer. Follow her on Twitter at @isabelslone.
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