(Go all the way down for haute couture inspiration, the pieces are 55 years apart!!! )

But first, my mundane black pants….

Sometimes in one’s sewing life, one needs to get over oneself. Occasionally you may not feel you want to follow all the protocols of good and clean sewing. Such was my trajectory with the black pants I stitched this week. And, I’m okay with it.

All the Feels….

Wearing the pants, nothing seems sub par. As always, the fabric is excellent quality ponte knit from Sew Much Fabric — it has rayon and therefore wide legged loose pants drape just how I like them.

I did not bother to serge-finish the seams, or finish them some other way. Because, I didn’t feel like it! Is that reason enough? Besides, ponte knit is never ravelly at the cut edges.

On the outside, I did not feel I wanted to sew the included design panels on the pant legs — honestly, those seams are what make this pattern so appealing, and I have made many with those seams. Not today….

So why use this pattern anyway, with the standout seaming when I won’t include that feature? Because, the upper portion (waist, hip, crotch) is a perfect fit, from which point I could do as I liked, eliminate the paneled seams and turn this pair into boring, black wide legged pants.

I chose to make black pants, because a sudden thought hit me while evaluating the array of pants in my wardrobe— last year I reached out for black pants on most mornings, after looking and admiring the coral, lime green, forest green pairs….. you get the picture. Today, I am wearing merlot (maroon) pants as I type. Yay. But, the black pairs got l the most use. Unfortunately, I had only two — one is the Vogue 1411 (out of print) in a narrow leg version, and the other a jean-ey, boot-cut style in a stretch. jeans pattern by Jennifer Stern. Both were made many years ago and are still good to wear (ponte knit never dies). Neither are worn out by my standards. But lately I was getting naggy feelings about the need for a loose leg black pant. So here we are.

Giving in to all the feels above resulted in this flappy pair which I think will see a lot of use, starting now. Wait, what about the next black pant — maybe a loose and casual capri length in black linen? By the way, who says you can’t wear black in hot Texas summers?

For this week’s haute couture inspiration, look #21 presented by Valentino at the Spring Couture 2022 show. It makes my heart sing. Then, look at the 1967 Oscar de la Renta — is it inspiration for Valentino? Things are very rarely new in fashion.

Samina