White trousers with a wide leg fit either soar or sink on fabric and fall. They need to hold their shape through hip and thigh, then fall away in a flattering panel from knee downwards, with enough substance in the fabric to swing rather than stick to your legs. Cotton drill, heavyweight linen mixes and thick, tightly woven twill all achieve this. Thin fabrics or those with too high a polyester count will crease where you don’t want them to, cling around your leg when you don’t want them to and most obviously betray every line and detail of whatever padding you have underneath, which is why it’s doubly important these things aren’t noticeable when wearing white, and why the cut needs to provide its own structure.
Fit is everything with white wide leg trousers. Waist should fit properly and not gap, and you should still have a decent break at the front to stop the leg resembling a tent.
Tailored wide leg trousers with a high rise work harder than an elasticated waistband slip-on because they provide the eye with somewhere defined to rest before the fabric billows away. Length also can’t be compromised, if they’re too short the whole look gives up and falls over.
Busting the floor or hitting the top of your heel is where the shape really comes into its own.
Because wide leg trousers make such a statement at the bottom, you usually want to offset that with something fitted above, whether it’s a knit tight to the body, a tucked in shirt or a cropped jacket, so that your whole look doesn’t resemble some weird mash-up of geometric shapes. Something as simple as an open blazer and tee underneath is a classic pairing for daytime meetings/appointments or lunches. For night time, swap the blazer for a strapless top, or even just a slimmer tank with gold hoops and a heeled sandal and you’ve taken that same pair of trousers from everyday to effort. White trainers work too when the hem is spot on, especially if they have a chunky white or nude sole, but the trousers have to be genuinely full, rather than just loose-fitting or it will always look half finished.
In terms of when to wear them, these trousers can handle pretty much any occasion that you put a bit of thought into. Wedding seasons sunshine sans groom, weekend city breaks, long lunches and evenings that go from restaurant to bar. They photograph well, move well and are why despite being, theoretically, the single most impractical thing you can wear; white wide leg trousers will be on nearly every brand’s spring/summer rail. (See below for trouser fabric that can actually survive being worn once you buy them.)
