Help! My Style is Changing and Now I Need New Pants
It's not a phase, mom!
Picture this: I was getting ready for work one day. I’m a teacher (not a full-time writer yet, unfortunately), and working with 9-year-olds, I need to ensure whatever I wear is suitable, comfortable, and looks good. I was getting ready, I was putting on my new favourite shirt from the Uniqlo: C collection (yes, it’s ok to like affordable garments sometimes, I’ll write about it later), I pulled out some pants
…wait. These don’t look good.
That’s ok, let’s try my Brain Dead cotton twill pants. Nope, those don’t work either… Ok, how about my Salt + West trousers? hmm. too short.
Fuck. I need new pants.
This is frustrating for Jawnzmen, particularly in transitional seasons. You spent all summer getting excited to wear your favourite pair of Homecore quilted pants. But on the first slightly chilled Autumn day, you realise: they don’t sit right anymore.
But why does this happen? Simple. Your style has changed (I want to refrain from using the words p*rsonal s*yle). Your interests may have shifted, you watched a movie where a character dressed in #menswear, and you’re still wearing gorp. Things change, people change, and sometimes your pants need to!
Or maybe it’s a phase. I know that at least once a year, I become infatuated with sartorial #menswear myself. I want to buy vintage RL suits, wear loafers to brunch, wear a tie to the grocery store. It's almost like a cosplay — but instead of dressing up like Iron Man, you’re wearing vintage Armani to the deli.
And that’s the beauty of being a Jawnzmen: every so often, you’ll get wrapped up in a subgenre, label, “-core”, or even a specific garment that throws a midwest emo riff into your three-piece jazz set and becomes your personality for a moment.
After a while, it fades, and you go back to your standard uniform. But the beauty that comes from this phase is that we often take the aspects we thought were the best and cement them into our personal style.
As I mentioned earlier, at least once a year I get obsessed with the whole suiting–loafering–coating pipeline. I’m actually in that phase right now. There’s something about dressing professionally for pleasure that’s always fascinated me, but I’ve never quite managed to execute it well enough to be satisfied. I digress.
Today, I’m going to share some of those style swerve moments from my life.
Paraboot Michaels.
For the longest time, I was obsessed. It’s the perfect juxtaposition of in-your-face chunk, but elegance beyond belief — rugged, yet somehow refined. When I finally bought them, I wore them to work with a shirt and tie and felt like I was doing something. But once the sartorial phase passed, I figured they’d go the way of other failed experiments.
They didn’t.
They stuck.
Now they’re a staple.
Clarks Wallabees.
…and then, sometimes things don’t go as planned.
Once in my annually grown man streetwear/wannabee menswear phase, I copped some Clarks Wallabees. To preface, I LOVE the look of wallabees (even today I still love the way a Wallabee looks), and I wore them like crazy when I first got my pair. But as time went on… the honeymoon phase ended. I began to resent them.
The toe shape didn’t look as nice as other pairs I’d seen online, and now they kinda just collect dust in my wardrobe. A good idea, but not the right one for me.
Running completely took over my personality, and it’s still got me in a chokehold to this day. I love the runner’s aesthetic. I love it on the track, in the coffee shop, or in the workplace (but maybe leave your 3” shorts at home for that one). I love wearing my overly priced Satisfy hoodie to work and risk having it ruined by snotty kids. I love wearing my Adidas Evo SLs even though I’m just doing daily tasks. I love vintage runningcore (not y2k running core*) and current day runningcore.
Mixing everyday with technical looks so good. It’s not for the faint of heart, but it’s cool to connect the contrasts between a button-up shirt and a pair of interval shoes.
When I look back on my own style experiments, I ask myself this question:
Will I regret going full runningcore in a year? Possibly.
Will I regret wearing supershoes with a pair of pleated trousers?
Absolutely not.
*“but Ted, Asics GT-2160s are y2k-”
SHUT UP.