Issey Miyake Homme Plissé Trousers – Plum

Rounded through the thigh is an unusual specification and it is the whole garment. Most trousers are cut either straight or tapered, both of which are essentially flat decisions about width. A rounded thigh means the leg is shaped in three dimensions to curve outward and then back in, so the trouser holds a soft volume at the top of the leg and narrows below it without ever creating a crease or a hard line. Combined with the pleating, which supplies a fine vertical texture across that curve, the result is a trouser with genuine shape and no sharpness anywhere in it. Sleek and effortless are the right words for it: the garment reads as considered at a glance and turns out, on closer inspection, to contain no tailoring whatsoever.

The colour

Plum violet is the more interesting of the two and the reason to choose this one. It sits at the point where a purple becomes dark enough to behave like a navy or a charcoal, so it goes with almost as much while never quite being a neutral. In pleated cloth the colour shifts noticeably between the lit and shadowed faces of each fold, which gives it depth a flat plum would not have.

A rounded thigh is a three-dimensional cut and very few trousers attempt it. It gives the leg shape without a single hard edge, which is exactly what this cloth is good at.

100% polyester, made in the Philippines, in Plum Violet. Pleated, rounded through the thigh.

Rounded through the thigh and narrowing below. Pleated cloth opens as it is worn, so expect more room in motion.

Plum against black is the sharpest combination; against cream or camel it warms considerably. Because the colour is doing the work, keep the top half plain.

The pleats are heat-set into the polyester and are permanent, so they wash without losing them. Wash at 30°C or below in a laundry net on a short cycle, or press gently by hand, and never tumble dry, iron, steam, or dry clean. Store rolled along the direction of the pleats. Our fabric care guide covers polyester and technical cloth.

The same trouser in navy is the sibling colourway. Then the Basics Jacket and the Monthly Color October pant in pumpkin, which is the line's other unconventional colour. There is more on the house on the Issey Miyake designer page. Everything we carry from Issey Miyake is listed together.