8 Spring Summer Wool & Silk Pants Perfect for 158cm Petite Women – Effortless Comfort & Style
It's quite challenging to dress comfortably and appropriately in spring. Beijing's spring is affected by the Mongolian high pressure system, which brings occasional strong winds and fluctuating temperatures. Some days you can wear short sleeves and sunglasses under the bright, windless sun, while a few days later even three cashmere sweaters won't keep you warm enough, especially when I'm sitting in front of the computer for hours. Eddy always wants me to stretch during breaks and do eye exercises, but when I'm researching a topic, I get so absorbed that I even forget to drink water. I only take a break between finishing one task and starting the next.
In May, at the transition between spring and summer, I'm organizing my spring and summer trousers. I generally prefer 100% wool and 100% mulberry silk, occasionally mixed wool and silk blends or hemp/linen with silk blends. In spring and summer, we favor these three fabric types.
In Beijing, I recommend wearing wool trousers when temperatures are between 8-20°C in April, as silk and linen/hemp trousers would be too cold, while the upper body needs two medium or thin cashmere sweaters. During the occasional hot 1-2 days in April and during May's 12-28°C weather, you can wear silk and linen trousers, paired with a cashmere sleeveless top and a small cardigan.
I am 158cm tall, weigh 58kg, with a 68cm waist. I usually wear Italian size 38 for trousers, with some requiring length alterations. For Chinese and Japanese brands with elastic waistbands, I wear US size 2 or 0, size 4 for regular buttoned trousers, and size 2 for looser wide-leg pants.
Wool Trousers
Wool trousers can be worn in Beijing during April and also October, making them transitional seasonal clothing that bridges the silk before and cashmere after. I currently have 3 pairs of wool trousers.
My favorite is from Agnona, 88% wool and 12% mulberry silk. Due to the thicker fabric, the silk doesn't provide much cooling effect but rather makes the fabric smoother and more skin-friendly. I've detailed the fabric and features in Agnona Pants, which includes videos.
Agnona's wide-leg trousers are designed to drag on the ground, even on their website models, so they definitely need shortening. I had to shorten mine by 10cm to make them suitable.
In Kiton's 4 Core Casual Trouser Styles for Men and Women, I compared Agnona and Kiton's women's wide-leg trousers and men's straight-leg trousers. Agnona's trousers for both men and women have more fashionable lines. Comparatively, Agnona has better line design for wide-leg trousers, while Kiton excels at straight-leg and tapered trousers. Kiton's spring/summer women's trousers are all 95%-100% mulberry silk, which I'll discuss in the second section below about silk.
In the photo below, note the smooth curved line on the left leg, unlike Kiton's wide-leg trousers that simply fall straight down. This type of line is more fashionable and has been trending in recent years. Barrie cashmere trousers have a similar style, but with more curve and some styles being slightly flared, while Agnona uses straight wide-leg trousers as their base style, adding lines to enhance the design.
My second pair of wool trousers is from Less's premium collection. The Chinese brands mentioned in this article are Less, JNBY, and Icicle. Fortunately, I bought these early, around 2022, when China's fashion market wasn't as frivolous and flashy as it is now. The quality was decent, practical, and Chinese brands were well-suited for shorter Chinese body types with shorter legs, requiring no alterations.
However, after wearing them for a year, I've found these trousers must be ironed, or they'll look wrinkled like in the right image. Also, having owned better quality wool trousers, I now find these average, basic mass-market items that fit comfortably.
The style has a slight curve, which is very fashionable.
My third pair of wool trousers is from the Japanese brand Enfold, a mass-market brand similar in price to China's Less, comfortable and consumer-friendly. Due to its positioning, the wool quality is the roughest and tends to attract lint, but fortunately has a lining. Being Japanese, the lining is naturally Bemberg cupro silk. Of all synthetic fibers, only cupro is good - comfortable, breathable, and cool. I have a pair of summer shorts also made with cupro.
Comparing these 3 wool trousers, you'll notice that more expensive trousers not only have finer, more lustrous fabric but also more fluid lines. While Enfold's trousers have wool fabric that attracts lint and can be scratchy, you can see from the image below that the trouser lines aren't smooth.
They're suitable for everyday activities like hiking. Enfold is a niche Japanese casual commuter women's brand with minimalist designs and relatively good fabrics for its price point. Worth considering if you're on a budget.
This set of photos was featured in the National Botanical Garden vlog video. This small courtyard is quite nice, with mountains on the right side. Raising chickens and ducks, farming, and making some delicious food would make for a great content creator lifestyle, with an atmosphere reminiscent of ancient Chinese pastoral life. I learned a new word: idyllic.
Silk&Linen Trousers
I have 4 mulberry silk trousers, plus one that's a 50% mulberry silk and linen blend.
The best silk trousers here are Kiton's 100% silk pair. Kiton's distinctive feature isn't elegant curved silhouettes, but rather the front crease of tailored trousers. As a brand that focuses on men's tailoring, they lean toward formal styles, adding trouser creases even to women's elastic waistband pants to increase formality.
Good mulberry silk has luster, tight knitting, and thickness, which this pair has. Kiton is the tailoring brand with the highest fabric standards, and their mid to high-end men's and women's wear are all worth buying.
My second favorite silk trousers are these gray 100% silk joggers. They're an older style from Icicle from 2022, when their materials were still substantial. Back then, their most expensive pieces had great design and fabrics, but now they increasingly cut corners, focus too much on marketing, use excessively thin fabrics, and are starting to exploit consumers. That's why I previously criticized Icicle, and I don't look at their collections from the past two years anymore.
Both these and the Kiton trousers above are suitable for wearing in May, June, and September, as they're made from heavyweight silk. They're still a bit warm for July and August during the hottest days.
These trousers pair best with Pedro Garcia silk satin shoes from our 18 pairs of spring and summer shoes, as they both have similar silk luster.
The third pair of 100% mulberry silk trousers is from Alexander Wang with a nameplate. After the pandemic, understated styles became popular, and in recent years, anything with a brand logo hasn't been trendy. Therefore, there are few items with nameplates on their official website, especially prominent gold ones.
This brand leans toward celebrity streetwear. It's my first purchase from them, and their trousers mainly consist of fashionable jeans with occasional silk options. The silk quality isn't the heaviest, but the design, fit, and value (bought on discount) make up for it. These are flared wide-leg trousers.
These Alexander Wang trousers are too long, dragging on the ground even on models, just like Agnona's. I shortened them by about 10cm, as non-dragging trousers are more practical for daily life. I wear these in US size 4, with the waist being slightly large but fitting well in the hip area.
From the image, you can see that this silk fabric is quite dense. Honestly, if I hadn't checked the care label, I might have thought it was polyester. Textile technology has advanced significantly in recent years - wool can be made to feel like cashmere, and even lyocell can mimic mulberry silk. That's why it's better to shop at reliable brick-and-mortar brand stores, otherwise fabrics can easily be misrepresented, with wool sold as cashmere or synthetic fibers sold as mulberry silk. In recent years, fabric marketing has also become more prevalent.
From the seams of the cut fabric, you can see that the Italian craftsmanship of Agnona on the right is superior, with hidden seams, unlike the ordinary pressed seams on the left. These two brands are not positioned at the same level.
For ordinary people, if you have a little belly, you just do, and many clothes suitable for real-life scenarios can conceal it. From all the articles I've written and photos I've taken, you can probably tell that I actually have quite a large tummy. I've had a protruding belly since childhood, and I can't get rid of it now.
The chain with the nameplate can't be removed from both sides, which makes it quite inconvenient to wrap around. I just let it hang by my left side where my bag is.
The fourth pair is also an old Icicle style, made from 100% Xiangyunsha silk (black silk). The fabric is thinner than the two pairs above and can occasionally be worn during the hottest times.
Both of these Icicle women's trousers are quite roomy in the thigh area. The overall lines of the design are not as good as luxury brands - they're not as smooth and have some unevenness. But considering the price, and that the older styles used substantial fabrics, they're still decent.
In the past, Icicle's prices and fabrics were slightly higher than the Japanese Enfold and Less mentioned above. They all fall into the commuter brand category. But nowadays, I'd be cautious about Icicle. Regarding Xiangyunsha silk, it's best to choose those produced in Guangdong. Now Hangzhou also produces Xiangyunsha, all processed with technology. Icicle has been using Xiangyunsha fabric for men's and women's clothing every year, but in recent years, I feel their fabrics are getting thinner and looser.
The fifth pair is an old Icicle style made from half mulberry silk, half linen fabric. I must admit that Icicle used to explore many unique Chinese fabrics with special textures.
Pure linen fabric wrinkles easily, but adding mulberry silk improves this, making it more comfortable and less prone to wrinkling. Mauro Ottaviani's spring and summer fabrics blend cashmere, linen, and mulberry silk, while Kiton's spring and summer men's trousers blend linen with wool.
This style is more fitted, resembling tailored trousers. The color is cream white, which pairs well with white sneakers in summer for an old money look.
Epilogue
These are my 8 pairs of spring and summer trousers, all made from natural fabrics that are very comfortable. The price differences reflect the quality of fabric and smoothness of the design. I buy just 2-4 pairs of trousers per year, slowly updating my collection. We both care more about quality and comfort, with styling being secondary. Good quality clothes may look ordinary at first glance whether you match them randomly or carefully, but the actual wearing experience will be excellent.
This spring and summer trousers post can be viewed alongside our 15 pairs of spring and summer shoes.
I really like the photos in this post - the scenery is beautiful. The mountains in the background are gently rounded, not too tall or sharp, and it's spring with everything growing and lush green. I specifically mentioned this at the end of the National Botanical Garden vlog. As for my English, I still need to practice for another two years. Honestly, when I look back at the videos I've filmed, I feel embarrassed whenever I have to speak English.
pamperherself
