Camiel Fortgens Suit Pants

The cloth is a cotton and linen blend, which is the combination that solves the tailored summer trouser. Linen alone holds a line and gets hot and creases hard; cotton alone stays cool and goes limp. Together they give a trouser enough body to keep a shape and enough dryness to be worth wearing in July. The cut is the second thing worth knowing: wide through the top and tapered from the knee down, so the volume sits where volume is comfortable and the leg still ends cleanly. And then the beltline is left raw, which on a trouser called Suit Pants is the whole joke and the whole point at once. A waistband is the most constructed part of a trouser and the part nobody sees. Leaving its edge cut is a quiet way of saying what kind of tailoring this is.

Why we selected it

A trouser you can wear to something without it wearing you is a genuinely difficult thing to buy. This one gets there with cloth and proportion rather than with a lining and a canvas.

A raw edge somewhere structural is how this house signs a garment, and on a tailored trouser it lands harder than it does on a tee.

Materials and construction

Fifty-four percent cotton and forty-five percent linen, made in Portugal. Wide through the top, tapered through the knee, with a raw hem at the beltline. Color: Light Blue. The two figures given sum to ninety-nine, and we have not invented the missing percent. See the flag below.

Fit notes

Wide at the top and tapered from the knee, so the fit is decided at the waist and the seat rather than at the ankle. Linen in the blend will crease at the hip and behind the knee across a day and settle rather than set. Neither fiber has any recovery in it, so these relax as they are worn and come back with washing.

Styling

With the Boxy Shirt untucked. With the Big Shirt Blockprint when the shirt should carry the outfit. Under the Short Mac Coat.

Care

Wash gently and cool, or have them cleaned, then dry flat or on a line rather than hot. Press while slightly damp, which is when linen takes a crease and holds it. Our care guidance covers the rest.

Related pieces

The Normal Jeans are a five-pocket cut in cotton canvas, with the hems left raw. Everything we carry from Camiel Fortgens is listed together.