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Kendrick Lamar’s bootcut Celine jeans were arguably the star of his Super Bowl half-time performance. It’s not just Lamar, though: bootcut jeans were seen across a few runway shows for Autumn/Winter 2025 and SS25, including at Louis Vuitton (creative director Pharrell Williams himself is a bootcut aficionado) and Amiri. Will men start buying in?
It’s a polarising trend, says Zak Maoui, style director at the Gentleman’s Journal and former style editor at GQ. “I’ve only seen positive things about Kendrick Lamar’s instantly viral bootcut jeans from Celine, with people begging to know where they were from — but last week, X was full of people dissing Pharrell’s bootcuts,” he says.
It raises the question: is a viral moment from the right celeb enough to spark a revolution in men’s style? “What’s interesting is that after several years of flared jeans and trousers surging among vintage menswear enthusiasts emulating Bob Dylan and Serge Gainsbourg, figures like Kendrick and Pharrell have been recently making flares look contemporary rather than retro,” says Samuel Hine, senior fashion writer at GQ, adding that, inspired by Lamar, he just dug an old pair of Celine flares out of his closet.
Amiri SS25 menswear and Louis Vuitton menswear SS25.
Jeans and trouser silhouettes are ever-evolving. While baggier shapes have dominated the past five years, trend analysts say we’re likely to see the pendulum swing back. In womenswear, we’re already seeing a shift towards slimmer trouser silhouettes, which started during the AW24 shows and has been brought into the mainstream by TikTok creator Alix Earle. The Gen Z star released a pair of skinny jeans in January in collaboration with Frame, prompting a viral TikTok trend where users have been showing off how they’re styling the silhouette for 2025.
Analytics platform Heuritech predicts sales of wide-leg jeans to decline 3 per cent over the next year, while slim and straight-leg jeans are expected to grow 2 per cent and 4 per cent, respectively. “This shift illustrates the influence of quiet luxury, with its emphasis on more tailored, refined shapes, now making its mark on streetwear and casualwear as well,” says Heuritech fashion analyst Frida Tordhag.
Hedi Slimane, who was creative director of Celine until October, was the force behind the popularisation of skinny jeans for men, which he introduced at both YSL and Dior Men. “Celine — whose jeans Lamar is wearing — has been pushing this skinny-ish to mid-flare hybrid for a bit,” says Vogue Runway’s Luke Leitch.
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In some ways, bootcut is a middle ground between baggy and skinny jeans. “We’ve seen male shoppers embracing baggier styles and this feels like a natural evolution, with multiple ways to style and wear,” says Katy Lubin, VP of brand and communications at Lyst. Searches for men’s flared and bootcut jeans have increased 12 per cent on the fashion search platform over the past three months. Yet, bootcut still feels like a more daunting silhouette than slim or baggy to the average man — like GQ’s Hine says, bootcut is often associated with a more fashion-forward retro look.
“The bootcut or flare jeans trend definitely has the potential to take off commercially in menswear, but it will likely follow a gradual adoption rather than an overnight explosion,” agrees buying consultant Natasha Advani, who is former head of menswear buying at Selfridges and founder of Not/Applicable Vintage. “While high fashion and influential artists like Pharrell and Kendrick are already embracing flared silhouettes, mainstream menswear tends to take longer to shift, especially when moving away from the dominant baggy, straight-leg cuts that have been popular for years. If major denim labels and retailers introduce more subtle bootcut variations before going fully flared, it could ease the transition for mass-market consumers.”
Pharrell Williams is often seen wearing bootcut jeans.
In this sense, flares may give way for a slimmer silhouette in general. “Just as wide-leg shapes caused straight fit to overtake slim as the top invested denim shape, this season, flares could cause a switch back to slimmer-fitting jeans in 2025,” says Karis Munday, menswear analyst at retail intelligence firm EDITED.
According to EDITED research, baggy jeans are still on the up (rising 27 per cent year-on-year) — but growth is slowing considerably. The previous year, baggy jeans were up 150 per cent in menswear. Munday says she has noticed “an uptick in slimmer shapes on the AW25 runway”. This all has an impact on footwear choices too, adds Leitch.
The genuine impact of a viral trend can differ in menswear compared to womenswear. “Menswear, in contrast to womenswear, has traditionally been less influenced by viral internet moments,” says Heuritech’s Tordhag. “While trends in menswear don’t necessarily take longer to develop, there has historically been less interest in following the rapid shifts in aesthetics and trends that often dominate the fashion world.”
Nevertheless, men are “just as bombarded” by shopping inspiration as female consumers, says Lubin, so it can differ depending on the segment of male consumer. “There are clusters of menswear shoppers who are highly influenced by new drops from brands they love — whether that’s brands in the sportswear, contemporary or luxury space,” she says. “A viral moment for these shoppers isn’t necessarily driven by a global mega-celebrity, it could be more about the community of shoppers and tastemakers surrounding that brand all posting about or wearing a new product.”
There are some figures who are more prominent tastemakers than others, Lamar being one of them. “Certain celebrities create viral moments just about anytime they step outside wearing something unexpected. Kendrick is one of those people — he and his stylist Taylor McNeill know how to use clothing to stir conversation,” says Hine. “I do think these viral moments have an impact because a huge audience of men are seeing Kendrick — a superstar who embodies a very modern sense of masculinity — trying something out of the ordinary, which gives them license to do the same. That said, menswear tends to move slowly. It’s still a relatively niche style.”
Trend analysts agree. Tordhag expects the trend to “hold some appeal, but be less popular in the border mass-market segment”. Heuritech data shows that flare trousers will see 2 per cent growth in Europe during Q3 2025, compared with the year prior, but will decrease by 7 per cent throughout the remainder of the year.
Flared tailoring options have become more popular as male celebrities experiment with their red carpet looks. Pictured above, Harris Dickinson wears a Tiger of Sweden suit at the GQ Men of the Year Awards in November 2024.
Nevertheless, the relative accessibility of bootcut jeans makes it easy to experiment, particularly with secondhand styles. “I think if a viral moment is centred around a look or an item of clothing that is easily accessible to the public, then it will more likely result in an uptick in sales and virality of said product, and not just the social media virality of an image of a celebrity wearing it,” says Maoui.
All in all, the trend is likely to be reserved for a more fashion-savvy menswear shopper. “Like with most fashion trends that lean a little into the left field, I think there will be space for them in certain major cities — London, New York, Paris — where men are more willing to try different things. I can already see them on the streets here,” says London-based Maoui. “But I think baggier will always be more favourable, as bootcuts are still a pretty severe statement for guys who usually would wear straight-cut jeans. Do I think we’re going to see 30-something-year-olds in provincial towns up and down the UK wearing bootcut jeans just because one guy wore them for 15 minutes at the Super Bowl? No.”
Comments, questions or feedback? Email us at feedback@voguebusiness.com.
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