Letter of Rec #063: Suitable pants for winter
What makes a pair of flare pants good? Plus: thoughts on getting dressed at the turn of dawn to offset winter blues
Dressing at dawn
What’s the hardest part of the day for you this time of year? No question for me it’s the early morning hour between when my kids wake up and I have successfully gotten them out the door for school.
It doesn’t feel as grating when the days are longer and my kitchen is brighter and I don’t have to turn on the lights to see but this time of year something about the cocktail of feeling like when I wake up, it is still the night before, and the agony of layering all three of us up in: coats (I always forget to zip one of theirs up before putting on my gloves, then have to take off my gloves to zip up the coat, then put them back on — this is how you lose pinky rings), hats (every morning we go through the motions of the hat not fitting on at least one hairstyle), gloves (at least one of our 6 is always missing) and scarves (“I can’t breathe!”) (It’s me who says this), rubs up against me in such a way that I can’t break free from the dungeon of malaise.
And then there’s something, too about the grey — the cold and the grey and how that zaps the motivation I can muster to put on interesting clothes, which to me don’t feel like they want to show themselves when the weather is basically rejecting them. I miss the umph I’m usually able to derive from getting dressed in the morning.
I had a conversation earlier this week with a mom for the What to Wear feature and she was telling me about her morning routine, and how she gets dressed before getting her kids up, and how this small process allows her to feel more ready and armed to take on the day. I suspect it also has an impact on her kids — it’s got to feel different to see your mom come into your room presentably dressed and ready to roll as opposed to morning kerfuffled and still in her pjs.
I tried it out for two days this week and so far what I can tell you is that mornings do feel different when you have taken a moment to put the puzzle of getting dressed to feel how you want to together before you’ve done anything else. I’ve said before that getting dressed feels a bit like a moving meditation to me and if this is true for you too, there’s something nice about doing it first thing in the morning. The one caveat is that it does require your getting up like 20 minutes earlier than you would.
But then again, the thing about feeling better — you know, manifesting the life you want to live, is that the process of getting there is anti-instant-reward. You drink less so your mornings suck less even though it takes an element of sexiness out of your night, you eat food that’s good for you so that you can be sharper even though bad food tastes better, you budget so that you can put aside savings and take a vacation so you have something to look forward to when the mornings are dark, and you get up a little earlier so you can feel put together by the time of your first human encounter. It changes the emotional language of how you choose to start your day, you know?
I think the first thing I’ve said to Abie everyday for the past month is that I hate the winter. It has become such an automatic habit to give in to the behavior I enacted the day before, to say the same things and wear the same glum face and in a way it makes me a victim to the weather, which is the dumbest thing — the most uncontrollable of them all — at which to find yourself mercy.
I thought the getting dressed would actually make this worse (20 minutes earlier means 20 minutes darker and if I’m dressed then it really does feel like the night before) but actually, it’s nice to do something for you first thing in the morning. It feels intimate and personal and even triumphant in the same way it does when you’ve gone through something hard and come out the other side and feel like you know yourself better — like you can move through your own body with more ease. Makes me think that maybe intimacy is the positive flip-side of loneliness — that within the cracks of the moments we feel most lonely, there are calls to learn ourselves better. To become more tender and intimate.
What do you do to get through the hardest part of your days during the hardest stretch of time in your lifeworld? In our subscriber group text, a bunch of women have been sharing pictures of all sorts of things they’ve been making. I forget how the simple act of creating or tending to something you’ve made — a pot of plants or a pot of stew — can be the difference between a good day and bad.
What I mean by good/bad is really the difference between the kind of day that gives you energy, that makes you feel like you made progress and one that feels frozen — like it unconsciously followed the script of the one before.
Consider this a reminder that making new things just feels good. Even (or for someone like me, especially) when the thing is an outfit.
The bedroom chair look
Perfect segue into our heroic bedroom chair look of the week:
Heroic because
The sweater is not very heavy but is warm enough to wear a suede jacket as your overcoat (don’t do this unless its over 35 degrees F)
Which is an important quality this time of year when I want to throw up on my winter coat. I need more texture, dammit
Kenzo x Levi’s denim and suede combo fringe jacket at left (this anorak from Toteme is roomy and surprisingly heavy too), Stand Studio’s Icona biker jacket at right (I’d size up for a roomier fit. Here in a size 0 or 2 — with one in black; here in a size 10, here in a 2, 4, 6) 
J. Crew Wallace & Barnes work jacket, Michael Kors red patent leather peacoat (it’s 70% off), Mango blazer (for a big Prada energy) Also managed to wear a pair of tights (color purple) under the pants without feeling like my mobility was compromised
Under this coat, which is insulated (suede) is: the turtleneck you see (which kind of keeps my ears warm), layered over a cropped cashmere cardigan (this one is flirty!), over a long sleeve black t-shirt that’s wool, over a wool tissue-thin turtleneck (Intimissimi’s is pretty good, and $59).
But you’d never know it looking at these pics! Such is the magic of a dark over-layer. It works in partic because of the weight of the sweater. I’d say it’s somewhere in that sweet spot between Khaite-thick and Gabriela Hearst-thin.
As far as the bottom: wide wale corduroys, which are pretty warm as is. After I published the dispatch on corduroys and was turned on to the ones I’m wearing, I’m now convinced Issue Twelve’s cut are the ones. Not exactly flare, but not not flare either. And no stretch, so they roll up well if you’re shorter than me. Definitely easier going on a straighter frame, and if you’re going to try, I’d go with regular size or one up. They run a little big, but are pretty high waist and it’s nice to have the extra room for tucking.
I’m wearing a pair of tights under them with wool socks to keep my feet warm in the moccasins. A couple other times this week, I wore the look with Grenson’s suede fisherman shoes so if you have those in either finish, I recommend as a viable option.
What do you think, is it excessive to get them in black too?
Last thing I’ll say is on accessories. If you’re not going to wear a real coat, do wear gloves, and probably a hat, which I didn’t because I wanted to wear this giant velvet scrunchie from Turtle Story. The bag is meant to throw the rest of the look off a bit —
But still serves the pretty utilitarian function of keeping you hands free, and giving you the option of running a last minute errand like going to the grocery store for jello, vinegar and cream cheese without having to worry about where to stow your cool new ingestibles.
And for the main event: 5 flare pants recs (priced from $96 to $520)
What makes a pair of winter pants good?