The Chanel Way To Wear Skirts Over Pants

The couture crowd may have woken up all groggy following an all-night masquerade ball at the Musée Rodin celebrating Maria Grazia Chiuri's debut couture show for Dior, but there's no sleeping in on an invitation from Karl Lagerfeld — even if it has a 10 a.m. call time. Plus, Chanel's haute presentations are better eye-openers than the strongest expresso this side of the Seine (see: fall '16's Chanel Data Center, or even last spring's eco lodge redux at the Grand Palais). For his latest collection, however, there was no extravagant theme or stage set — rather, the clothes spoke for themselves.

Now, there's a few things we can always expect from a Chanel gathering: There's the gaggle of big-name models walking the runway (Bella Hadid, Kendall Jenner, Soo Joo Park, Lindsey Wixson, and even Lily-Rose Depp were all present this morning), there's the parade of tweed and bouclé skirt suits, adapted to the specific trends and colors of any given season, and there's the stellar evening wear which, while unattainable for most of the world in catwalk form, can outline a few key silhouettes to look out for come party season. In the Chanel couture universe, spring '17 will see a lot of tulip silhouettes, crystal-encrusted skirts, thick belts, and one particular outfit combination we may not have revisited since our grade school days: skirts over pants.

Lagerfeld followed in the footsteps of Raf Simons for Dior haute couture in reviving this beloved pairing. He did so by creating a seamless look with the layered bottoms: A skinny-fit trouser worn underneath a skirt or dress fashioned out of the same material, so it seems like a single garment. The top piece is belted high on the torso, pushing the waistline upwards and allowing the fabric to fall down more loosely over the pants. This is certainly an upgrade from technicolor leggings we wore under our denim smock skirts back in the day.

Click on to see how Chanel is bringing back this styling trick.