In March 2023, the TikTok creator Lizzie Greenberg was looking for answers. She took her conundrum to her audience, publishing a reel whose central theme revolved around the question: “Where are the girlies finding the pant?”
Greenberg elaborated, positing that “as women, we don’t have the pant”. The ‘pant’ in question, she explained, was one that could be worn when one wanted to look “a little more put together”, when jeans, leggings, tailored pants, cargo pants, linen pants or styles with “weird belts” simply wouldn’t do.
David Lynch is a surprising ally of Greenberg’s in pursuit of the perfect pant – the film director told GQ in a 2021 interview he’s well versed in the melancholy a trouser deficit can elicit. “I’m searching for a good pair of pants; I never found a pair of pants that I just love,” he said. “I like comfortable pants and clothes I can work in, that I feel comfortable in. I don’t really like to get dressed up. I like to wear the same thing every day and feel comfortable. It’s a fit, it’s a certain kind of feeling, and if they’re not right, which they never are, it’s a sadness. You know, it interrupts the flow of happiness. I’m working on it, believe me.”
Lynch’s quote struck a chord with the Sydney-based designer Lara Burnell, who founded her independent label Pantalon in 2022. So much so that his words form the opening paragraph on Pantalon’s brand introduction web page. The quote “grounds my entire vision, no matter where I am in the project,” explains Burnell – an alum of Roksanda Ilinčić and Maison Balzac – who says Lynch’s words “strike the right balance of why clothing matters”.
Burnell, and by extension Pantalon, feels strongly about pants, and the modern world’s demand for versatile clothing. “We want to be able to wear every type of shoe with our pants, and we want to be able to wear the same pants for a workday as well as a special occasion,” she says. “The lines are blurred.”
Is the pant the most essential element of the contemporary wardrobe? That’s for the individual wearer to say, but it did serve as the anchor point of Pantalon’s origins. “There’s no other article of clothing that contributed to women’s independence in the 20th century more than pants did,” says Burnell.
In launching Pantalon, Burnell set about to conjure pants that evoked the certain kind of feeling Lynch was searching for. She wanted something restrained, almost monastic in its design. A trouser devoid of bulk (“women have hips, butts and often smaller waists to accommodate for, not to hide or cover up”), that did not necessitate pleats, belts or other superfluous tailoring elements.
“Giorgio Armani’s famous approach was to remove the structuredness from a suit jacket to make it ‘more closely attuned to its wearer’, and I took this principle and applied it to the way women wear pants,” says Burnell. “Remove what feels unnecessary so that you’re left with what feels modern, comfortable and simple.”
The result was the Modern trouser. Crafted in an Italian suiting viscose-lycra blend, the material’s slight stretch and texture lend movement to the straight-leg silhouette, while its mid-rise cut allows the narrow waistband to hover just below the belly button. A flat front and invisible back zip make light work of an otherwise voluminous area – the full effect nods to the tailoring of the ‘60s and ‘70s, but perhaps most strongly to the ‘90s.
“The ‘90s was the decade of minimalism – pulling back from all the excess of the ‘80s silhouettes, so there’s longevity and simplicity in the styles of that era,” says Burnell. “To me, the mid-rise, straight-leg of Pantalon is a neutral silhouette, in the same way the Levi classic 501 style remains relevant through the decades, no matter what’s happening with fashion at the time.”
The Modern trouser ($400) is Burnell’s sartorial pocketknife, fit for all occasions (she wore a pair to her 2023 elopement, “because it felt elegant and casual, which was all I wanted”), and formed part of Pantalon’s debut ‘issue’ (what the brand calls collections). To date, Pantalon has released four issues, each riffing on Burnell’s take on luxury neutrals. There are ribbed halter neck tops, long-line collared coats and A-line mini skirts. Ultimately, however, all paths lead back to the pant – not simply for its aesthetic, but for its ability to bridge the past and present.
Lara Fells, the creative director and founder of Australian women’s ready-to-wear label St. Agni, has also spent time ruminating on the power of the pant. “Women fought hard for the right to wear pants, and while that’s part of the past, it still holds a powerful symbolism today.”
And as it is for Burnell, the ‘90s remains an enduring design influence for Fells. So much so that two pairs of St. Agni trousers – the 90s Panelled Pants ($579) and the 90s Relaxed Pants ($385) – feature the decade in their names. The former, with its mid-rise, straight-leg cut, also features a detachable belt and side and back pockets.
“Both of these styles have an inherent sense of ease; they’re effortlessly wearable,” says Fell, who recommends styling with a simple tee for a “relaxed, off-duty look, which I think resonates deeply with our customers.”
Further afield, the founder of Los Angeles-based vintage and ready to wear boutique RLT, Rachel Tabb, recently expanded the brand’s in-house line to include a single pair of trousers. Aptly named the RLT Pant ($279 USD), it was a labour of love perfecting the straight-leg, relaxed-fit style.
“When it came to designing the RLT pant I knew I wanted a true mid-rise. I have a few pairs of high-rise and low-rise vintage pants and for one reason or another, they all feel very site specific,” says Tabb. “I wanted them to be flowy enough to not feel suffocating, but fitted enough to remain flattering and maintain a shape on the body.”
She sourced a rayon-viscose blend, inspired by Tom Ford’s spring-summer 1998 collection for Gucci. Nineties-era designer archives are a formative influence for Tabb, who cites Calvin Klein, Ralph Lauren, Giorgio Armani, a Margiela-helmed Hèrmès and late ‘90s-to-early-‘00s Prada as mood board staples.
Family, too, is an important muse for Tabb, who says her mother served as her introduction to “understated elegance”. “My whole life she has looked like heaven in a cashmere sweater, blazer and vintage Levis or a simple tee and trousers. Like a ‘90s supermodel on-the-go.”
The search for ‘the pant’ may never truly end — David Lynch might attest that perfection, much like happiness, is an ever-elusive ideal. Yet, perhaps that’s the magic of this particular mid-rise, straight-leg style: it isn’t about a singular moment of sartorial satisfaction, but rather a quiet, steady presence in your wardrobe. A garment that meets you where you are, offering the subtle assurance that you can, even on your worst day, discover yourself in them.
