From Cool Britannia to blue eye shadow and super low rise jeans, many millenials and Gen Xers have looked on in horror as Gen Z have brought back dozens of the most jarring and unsightly noughtires and nineties trends.
But the most recent runway offering has brought back shocking memories of the skirt-over-trousers trend that plagued the early aughts.
Louis Vuitton and Bottega Veneta both sent models down the red carpet in a very impractical one-legged trouser at recent fashion weeks.
While Louis Vuitton sent a bright red version down the catwalk at their Paris spring/summer 2025 show earlier this month, Bottega Veneta teamed their black one-legged trouser with an oversized, belted blazer.
Meanwhile, avant-garde French brand Coperni presented three styles in a variety of luxurious fabrics at their Paris show.
The looks were also paired with long tops or dresses, giving many millenials flashbacks to the awkward trousers over skirt trend.
Having one leg exposed to the elements while the other is safely wrapped up may not appeal to the average shopper but, according to a prominent trend forecaster, the new trouser is simply another take on asymmetry, which has long been a feature of dresses, tops and other garments.
Speaking to Dazed, Agus Panzoni, said asymmetry has ‘grown in prominence’ since 2021 when ‘consumers began experimenting with silhouettes, moving beyond traditional symmetries and predefined categories.’
But Agus also ties the one-legged trouser trend into fashion aficionados’ ongoing interest in customisation.
Whether it’s the current trend for attaching soft toys to designer handbags or an older one which saw denim lovers cut up their jeans to the extent that skin rather than fabric dominated, customisation is both a way of standing out and a way of proving you belong to the fashion pack.
For Agus, one-legged trousers offer the opportunity for ‘experimentation on the leg that remains exposed’ – they provide fans with a blank canvas ripe for self-expression.
Others, however, saw the one-legged trousers that appeared on a number of catwalks in Milan and Paris at the beginning of the month as ‘a step too far.’
‘They looked sort of like trousers that had gotten snagged on a hook on the way out the door, and in the rush to get going, one half had ripped right off,’ wrote Vanessa Friedman, fashion director at the New York Times.
While October’s spring/summer 2025 shows certainly put one-legged trousers on the map, neither Louis Vuitton nor Bottega Veneta can be credited with inventing the eccentric garment.
In fact, the bold and bizarre style first appeared in 2018 thanks to US-based brand Sarah Aphrodite, according to Harpers Bazaar.
A year later, Korean label Pushbutton released its one-legged jeans, which seemed to have been inspired by Ukrainian designer Ksenia Schnaider’s half skinny, half wide-leg jeans – whose early fans included global superstar Céline Dion.
Yet even if a version of the one-legged style has previously received the celebrity stamp of approval, there’s no telling if it will take off when the latest designer collections hit the shops early next spring.
As NSS magazine said: ‘This type of pant doesn’t seem destined for huge commercial success – primarily due to the style’s complete impracticality.’
Its success will undoubtedly depend on whether high street stores like Zara and H&M, both of which are masters of designer dupes, choose to throw their weight behind the new, nonsensical trouser trend.
