How to Style Wide Leg Crop Pants for Summer Heat + DIY Jewelry

Today I'm sharing two outfits I wore this month featuring the popular wide leg crop pants silhouette. The standard advice here is to balance out the higher-volume, shorter pants with a fitted, tucked in top...and while I don't disagree that this combination looks great, I don't think it's the only way to wear them.

For summer temperatures, fitted and tucked on top sounds unpleasantly heat-trapping. I mean, do you really want to bust out your non-moisture-wicking bodysuit as we approach the start of July? And for some of us, a tucked in fitted shirt accentuates the "rotund character from the Alice in Wonderland books" aspects of our size/shape in a way that is sub-optimal.

John Tenniel's Humpty Dumpty & Tweedledee and Tweedledum - Wikimedia Commons

Humpty Dumpty in short pants - Wix AI image

So I'm going to show you two alternative types of tops to wear with wide leg crop pants, which is only two of the no-doubt myriad ways to style these pants. For me, these top options create a good balance of comfortable in the heat and flattering enough.

I'm wearing my dark grey Loft pants that are in regular rotation for me during the summer. The grey color is a great neutral for me, since I only have one pair of pants in this style, but I think these tops would work with a different neutral or accent color version as well.

Version 1: Loose and drapey top worn untucked

For me, air flow on my top half is key for summer comfort, so an easy, breezy top that is loose and drapey works very well. In this example, I am wearing a long-sleeved version, which might make you swelter to look at depending on your climate, lifestyle, and personal heat tolerance. But of course you can substitute a short-sleeved or sleeveless top (or roll up the sleeves to the elbow, which I do often.) This top is also made from a polyester blend, but for really hot weather, a more breathable fabric is ideal. The important aspects of this top are:

(1) the fit, which is loose/relaxed without being oversized; and

(2) the drape of the fabric, which allows the material in the lower half of the top to collapse nicely toward the body without clinging.

OOTD 6/4/24

To achieve the 1/3 & 2/3 vertical ratio (aka rule of thirds) that is considered the most flattering and elongating, my top would need to be a bit shorter or I would need to do a bit of a front tuck on it. If that is important to you, adjust your desired shirt length accordingly. I readily admit that I don't worry too much about whether I hit 1/3 & 2/3 or more like 1/2 & 1/2 in my outfits; at 5'8" I don't feel the need to look taller, and the "looking thin" train has definitely left the station. I think the vertical proportions in this outfit are flattering enough for me.

It's almost impossible to go wrong with a nude-to-you shoe color with cropped pants (or shorts or skirts/dresses).

In an atypical act of minimalism, I wore only one necklace with this outfit: a bulky silver-tone chain that delivers some visual impact despite being neutral.

Even though it seems like I wear a new set of paper bead bracelets every day, I really do re-wear them! You just saw this exact stack in my polished nautical look earlier this week; I merely wore them in a slightly different order on my wrist. {stretch bracelet tutorial} {bicone paper bead tutorial} {tube paper bead tutorial}

I am wearing new earrings, however...a sweet little DIY stack earring with red glass pearls, navy wood beads, and a silver flower bead. This outfit brings together the inspiration blouse, the paper bead bracelet set, and the earrings that were all made to coordinate with each other.

Version 1: Loose and boxy short (or short-ish) top worn untucked

Another great air-flow option for summer is a loose top made from a lightweight breathable fabric like cotton or linen. This striped top is one of several linen tops from Lands End in the same style that I love to wear in the summer. One obvious way this one differs from the top above is that instead of being drapey, it has stiffer fabric that creates a bit of structure. While I tend toward drapey fabrics rather than stiff ones in general, I do really like this particular style of top, and I think it works very well with the wide leg crops despite creating a bit of a volume-over-volume look. This kind of top looks great at a shorter length, and though I'm not wearing one that's genuinely cropped, you can go as short with it as you are comfortable with.

OOTD 6/12/24

I adore a pop of color ballet flat in the summer. I think there's something about the long slog of neutral boot-wearing in fall, winter, and spring that makes me ready for shoes that are lightweight and colorful when the warm weather hits. These bright pink flats pick up the pink stripe in the top.

I have paired a very simple and lightweight layered necklace, consisting of two DIY pieces, with the top...and I loved how it turned out. The longer pendant on a chain is a reversible paper pendant that I made specifically to coordinate with this top {tutorial}. The shorter beaded necklace is one I put together this spring as an experiment in using Chinese knotting cord for stringing a necklace. I selected a variety of small beads in several shades of pink and created a series of bead blocks (roughly 1-2" each). To finish the necklace, I knotted each end of the cord in a clamshell cover and added a lobster claw clasp.

You will be shocked to learn that my all-DIY daily bracelet stack started with a paper bead bracelet set that I made to coordinate with this top, as I detailed in this post. (I need a keyboard shortcut for "that I made to coordinate with this", haha.) The pink striped bracelet and pink/navy bracelet are fairly recent creations, part of a supplemental bracelet-making binge to switch up my options when putting a bracelet stack together.

My earrings are new "beads on stick" creations from my bead soup. These are earrings are a fairly eclectic combination of colors, materials, and shapes with the unifying element being the gold tone of the spacers and bead caps. And since they are, of course, made to coordinate with the top and bracelet set I'm wearing, the otherwise somewhat random-looking combination of colors makes more sense in context.

Do you ever wear wide leg crop pants in the summer? What is your favorite way to style them? How do you balance comfort and flattery in your summer outfits? Are there any outfit styles that make you feel like a character in Alice in Wonderland (in a good way or bad)?

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