Roughly 10 years in the past, I had the prospect to ask mannequin Miranda Kerr what she considered mother denims. I used to be interviewing her about present denim trends—learn: a high-rise denim lower beloved by the moms of millennials within the ‘80s and ‘90s—happened to be one of the buzziest new silhouettes floating around the mid-2010s zeitgeist. The term was actually so inside baseball at the time that the model looked at me in confusion and said, “I don’t know what that's, however possibly I ought to discover out now that I’m a mother.”
The irony is that, again then, the entire level of the design was that its connotations had completely flipped. Reasonably than catering to these on the playground scene, it was a youthful, IYKYK selection for a downtown crowd that had uninterested in skinny jeans. You’d be extra prone to discover it in a hole-in-the-wall thrift retailer than jean shopping on Amazon (the place now, a fast search at the moment yields seven full pages of outcomes). However lately? The high-rise, vintage-esque staple has lastly been standard lengthy sufficient to turn into a everlasting a part of a method lexicon—not solely does it work for everybody, however there’s simply a lot selection on the market to select from. The choice of 2024 pants caters to all physique varieties (curvy, petite, tall), and usually feels basic sufficient to work for various age teams. Higher but: Many labels have lastly discovered methods to clear up the dreaded waist-to-butt hole scenario behind the waistband.
In the meantime, the very definition of a “mom jean”has shifted. Now it usually describes denim with a sure high-waist, retro look, whereas the width and crop of the legs usually varies. Discovering a pair that works is a really private course of, and will depend on the look you favor—like, say, a baggy, wide leg Gen Z-adjacent vibe versus a extra polished, ankle-baring lower that’ll showcase your ballet flats. And as a style editor who’s been flirting with the look since its early days, these are the mother denims I swear by in addition to faves from business colleagues and trendy associates whose opinions we deeply belief.
The very best mother denims, at a look
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