Why are pants so hard?

Part of what makes fitting pants so hard is to know what a good fit is.

I thought it would be interesting to take a look at some movie stars and their pants and how they fit.  Mostly these are from the 50's and 60's because these were made of fabric, not stretch fabric.

Why?

Because stretch is not a fit.  Stretch is a fabric that fits no matter what, and fitting and making stretch pants doesn't require that much fit.  The other side of the coin is that stretch pant show ever error of your body, whereas a great fitting pair of woven fabric pants will make you look great.

So here we go.

I love using Marilyn cause in my day, she was the penultimate sexy symbol...she had the perfect figure that everyone wanted to emulate.  She was not skin and bones, she was voluptuous and very sexy.

Look at these pants...even though she's not standing straight, which is where you want to fit your pants, you can see that she has wrinkles in her pants.  Some of these are due to her position, but some are natural...the wrinkles in the middle are from when she's sat or stooped in them and these are natural wrinkles in woven fabric.  Also look to see how small her waist is compared to her hips.  This is fit well too - no drooping or excess around waist or hips.

I would like everyone to cut the picture below out and past it on their wall.  Look at the stomach this gal had and it was considered sexy.  It's also fit well.  If you look closely here you can also see some saddlebags - albeit small, but it's there.  See how there is fullness just below the hip line?  This helps mask this saddlebag look.

Another great shot of Marilyn's stomach and how well it's fit.  You can see in this check the darts and how they fit her waist and stomach.  And notice again the fullness below her saddlebags which helps mask the fullness through the lower hip/upper thigh area.

Reading the wrinkles here, the ones that are in her inseam, are natural for the position she has where she's standing on one hip.  This is common, but not ill-fitting.  If these wrinkles were pointing toward the crotch area, then we'd have a fitting problem, but seeing them being parallel to the ground, makes them OK - they just come from her body position.

OK - to one of my favorite movies (Gentlemen Prefer Blonds.  Note to self:  record the movie and take out some stills showing how well the clothes fit in this movie)....Look at Jane Russell's waist - it's small, small especially compared with her hips.  This was considered hugely sexy. And although it's really tough to see the detail on Jane's pants, you can see that every it fitted well here (see below for a better photo).  But there's something else - a little off subject, but the tromp l'oiell that is created by the men wearing nude colored trunks with black trim.  It really makes them look like they're not wearing anything which is kind of a fun way of doing these trunks.

OK - I lightened this up so you can see Jane Russell's pants better.  First notice the seams in her bodice, and notice the wrinkle in her right inseam.  This is caused by her standing on one hip. (Don't try and fit yourself while you're standing on one hip or another!).  But in my book this is fine.  The part that is amazing here is that Jane Russell has a very small waist to very large hips.  So this fit can be done.

Hopefully some of these make my point about fitting and how it actually can be done.  The actresses, models and women of the 50's and 60's had voluptuous, full figures - that's what was considered healthy (probably after seeing so much starvation in the conquered areas after WWII), being full-figured meant that you were healthy.

But what I wanted you to see out of this, is that not only is it possible, but it's done.  Fitting voluptuous bodies, full-figured bodies, irregularly shaped bodies - it can all be done.

And remember this.  Once you have that pattern, 99% of the battle of making pants is done.  It takes literally little or no advanced expertise to make pants.  The hard part is the fit.

Comments

[sewing spots]

Great post!

[RobinD]

Can you believe I had never watched "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes" until you mentioned it in a recent post. Fortunately, Netflix offers it via instant streaming so I watched it that day. I noticed those pants in that number, too.
You are right, those are some enjoyable wardrobes in that movie!

[Bunny]

So right! Pants are one of the easiest things we can make. That is, once we have the fit down. I really think the arrival of Madonna and her muscular physique is when it all changed. What will it take to have real women percieved as incredibly sexy, a la Monroe and Russell? Hollywood has so much influence on this.

[Karin]

Great post! You make good points about both fit and body image. And you are right, stretch trousers aren't a good fit, they are just stretchy and therefore show every lump and bump.

[ClaireOKC]

@RobinD - If you can see if you can stream the original "The Women" (1939) - the costumes in that are terrific cause each one of those women are not only different sizes and shapes but lifestyles - some funny, some serious, some innocent.

[Carolen]

I see that you have a dress form. What brand do you recommend? I have just an inexpensive one that adjusts.