Charcoal Gray Cotton High-Waisted Wide-Leg Trousers

The 1970s blazer's relaxed three-button stance and soft shoulders telegraph the decade's casual approach to power dressing, while those charcoal wide-legs from the '90s carry forward the same anti-fitted philosophy with their dramatically pleated front and easy drape. Both pieces reject the body-conscious tailoring that bookended their respective eras — the blazer thumbing its nose at '60s mod precision, the trousers offering refuge from '80s shoulder pads and '00s skinny tyranny.

These two pieces speak the same menswear dialect, separated by decades but united in their crisp appropriation of masculine codes. The shirtdress borrows its button-front geometry and utilitarian breast pocket directly from men's work shirts, while those high-waisted trousers echo the voluminous proportions of 1940s men's suiting that the '90s loved to raid.

That crisp white blazer with its razor-sharp shoulders and the charcoal wide-leg trousers both mine the same vein of borrowed-from-the-boys tailoring, but they're after completely different effects.