Everything You Need To Know About Flared Pants!

Flared pants are back—now. Today, I’ll tell you. This is awful news for many of you. Others may be ambivalent. Few are excited.

The last group is right, though. That’s good. This may be good. I know that sounds absurd. OK. Y2K fashion is memorable. “Bootcut” jeans clung to thighs but pooled over Etnies sneakers. It was much worse than TikTok said. In the trash-heap of bedazzled pockets, terrifyingly little rises, and painfully ill-informed wash treatments, there was a gem.

Remember when fashion experts said a slight flare gives a longer leg line and flatters every body type? True. Today’s flares sit better over boots than their slim and skinny rivals, despite the old-school hems soon outgrowing the essential size. These are merely practical concerns. The actual alchemy behind the flare’s comeback is passion.

See, anything-goes, let-your-freak-flag-fly pants have been popular for years. Because the era before now was skinny-dominated. Everyone was wearing cigarette trousers and low-top shoes for so long that it stopped being revolutionary—which it was when Hedi Slimane proposed the silhouette at Dior—and started feeling…regular. Instead of slowly cooking to death, we strangled our calves.

Ready to dive in? Let’s start with Top 6 Flared Pants For Men in 2023 With Teeanime

Wrangler Wrancher Dress Jean

Pendulum started swinging. True. Instead of going one way, it went a million. Tapered! Lax! Straight leg for trads and dads, drop crotch for fashionistas. Everything was in play. Is. But for the flair.

For many, the flare was and still is the one forbidden style of pants. We may be gun hesitant after its last outing. But isn’t it ridiculous to embrace everything from wide-leg painter pants to enormous wool trousers and leave this one style, which seems mild, out of the mix? I agree. Designers and brands appear to agree.

Levi’s So High Bootcut Jeans

The flare has been creeping back into the mix during the last few years. For several seasons, fashion houses like as Acne Studios and Gucci have released tailored versions, often in the setting of a suit. Similar styles are currently available at Louis Vuitton and Dior. On the mass-market side of the equation, Levi’s has recently pushed styles like the updated So High Bootcut—a very ’70s-flavored flare—to compliment old-reliables like the 527. And labels like Abercrombie (for the ex-bros) and Wrangler, with its Cowboy Cut denim and (genuinely wonderful) Wrancher “formal jeans,” never completely abandoned their bootcut offerings. Designer labels like Casablanca and Wales Bonner are incorporating flare into athletic-inspired garments like track trousers. It’s happening, guys. Whether you like it or not.

Acne Studios Flared Ruffled Wool and Mohair-Blend Trousers

So, what’s the hurry? For starters, you can’t deny the present influence of the 1970s on menswear. Funky prints, tinted shades, and flowing shirts. All of these are still going strong, and the flared pant fits right in. Perhaps everyone simply hopes they could do cocaine from a glass-and-brass coffee table in the Hollywood Hills.

However, it appears to be part of something larger and more organic: the natural ebb and flow of fashion. Something becomes fashionable. It achieves ubiquity. As companies and Instagrammers compete for attention in an increasingly saturated marketplace, it begins to shift, twist, and mutate into an exaggerated version of itself. (Another example is the enormous Frankenstein sneakers that emerged from the dad-shoe fad.) We eventually become tired of it, just like those floppy, low-rise, ultra-tight flares of yesteryear.

COS Slim-Fit High-Rise Flared Jeans

After that, enough time has passed. Something new, such as the skinny jean, enters and goes through the same life cycle. Looking back, we know that what we eventually rejected was a distorted form of the thing. We begin to wonder what a more subdued pair of flared pants could be capable of. And as early adopters, who tend to be stylish, begin to incorporate it back into their clothes, we discover, Hey, that actually looks very good. And all of a sudden, you’ve got a few flares in your rotation.

Gallery Dept. La Flare Distressed Two-Tone Jeans

Again, I understand that this may not be welcome news. Perhaps I can soften the blow. Because one huge advantage of this burgeoning moment over the last time around is that there’s not one style to rule them all. You may wear your flares and baggies and slim-fits and anything the hell you want. But the truth is that flares are back in the conversation—and possibly your wardrobe. After all, it was unavoidable.

Vetements Flared Distressed Jeans