White pants: the ultimate stain collector. I advocate for them heavily, year-round, despite that propensity. My favorite pairs are five pockets, which are easy to treat and wash when they get stained.
But today I present the cream flannel trouser in all its dry-clean-only glory. This pair is from Spier & Mackay, which I picked up during their Boxing Day sale. As someone asked on Styleforum recently: How do you keep your ankles clean?
The answer is: You don’t. And you don’t worry about it.
Last winter at Pitti 97, Milad Abedi, the style photographer, wore a pair of cream flannel trousers one day. Not until you got up close did you see the small stains on them. He didn’t seem to mind, and looked great all day.
Lino Ieluzzi, the iconic menswear shop owner from Milan, had a white flannel topcoat on one day. He looked magnificent. But zoom in with that 200mm lens—there’s a couple stains on his lapel. He didn’t seem to mind, and looked great all day.
The other thing about this particular pair of cream flannels is that they’re slightly transparent. I know there are thicker off-white flannels out there—No Man Walks Alone sold some made by Rota a couple winters ago—that don’t show anything through.
But it is a non-issue for me. First, wear a tailored jacket with them and that’ll cover the majority of what you care about hiding. Second, outdoors it’s really not noticeable. Third and most importantly, who cares? So what if someone can see that your pants have a seam on the side and pockets in the front—gasp! The horror!
Get some off-white flannels and stop worrying about them. It’s going to be OK.
(Help support this site! If you buy stuff through my links, your clicks and purchases earn me a commission from many of the retailers I feature, and it helps me sustain this site—as well as my menswear habit ;-) Thanks!)
If you’re just getting into tailored menswear and want a single helpful guide to building a trend-proof wardrobe, buy my eBook. It’s only $5 and covers wardrobe essentials for any guy who wants to look cool, feel cool and make a good impression. Formatted for your phone or computer/iPad so it’s not annoying to read, and it’s full of pretty pictures, not just boring prose. Buy it here.
