Our tip came from Sight Unseen editor Monica Khemsurov, who got word from lawyer Meg Brown. Brown saw the lightweight, quilted, no-name Amazon pants on Jessie Winograd, a massage therapist who is part of the cast of the play Terce: A Practical Breviary, which opened in January at the Space at Irondale in Fort Greene and was created by Heather Christian, who also has a pair. Winograd sent a link to the pants to the play’s 30-plus-person cast after being sent the same link by fellow cast member Ciera Cope — who, it turns out, had noticed the pants during rehearsal on musician Amy Santos. The first time Santos wore the pants, she happily received a handful of compliments but didn’t think too much of it. Until, all of a sudden, it seemed like every cast member of Terce — a play that reimagines what happens during Catholic morning Mass — was walking around in a pair.
The pants in question are from Wrolem, one of those mysterious Amazon brands like Orolay, the company behind the Upper East Side’s favorite coat. Though technically called Winter Warm Down Cotton Pants Thicker Padded Quilted Pants, the Wrolem pants are made from a summery padded cotton and come in either black, green, gray, or orange with a gingham-lined hem that can be cuffed. You might even mistake them for old Caron Callahan or new Cordera (a version of its quilted pants is selling for $416 — on sale — at Ssense). “They look like I got them from one of those places that only sells beige things,” says cast member Sarah Lefebvre, who works in marketing and owns a pair. “I could imagine seeing the pants for $100 somewhere.” In fact, they’re just $39.65 — which, of course, was part of their intrigue. They only have 17 reviews on the site, and if you weren’t sent a link you might not have clicked on them at all.
“I did a lot to publicize the pants by never taking them off,” Winograd, who many Terce cast members credit with popularizing the pants, says. “I was a billboard.” The pants, which have a thick elasticized waistband and are available in sizes small to XL, fit all shapes and sizes of cast members. “Truly, it was Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants in real life,” says Avery Richards, a cast member who also works as a costumer. A few cast members even own more than one pair — including Reverend Grenetta Briggs Mason, who was part of the play’s choir and didn’t wait a week after her first pair arrived before ordering her second. According to Mason, on any given day of Terce’s run, “You could expect one of us to have on our pants.” The number of people who owned the pants grew. “One person wearing those pants is a statement — ten is a cult,” says Frances Higgins, a cast member.
The pant’s appeal, according to cast members, lies in their sweatpant-esque silhouette, and the fact that you can throw them on without drawing too much attention to yourself. “They’re not supposed to be flattering — I mean, they are, but they’re not going to cinch your waist,” says Richards. “They’re not intended at all for the gaze of anyone else except for those in the know,” Winograd says. “I wouldn’t say they’re pants that your run-of-the-mill straight man would think are attractive.” As Winograd’s husband puts it: “They leave everything to the imagination.” Most of all, the pants are versatile: Cast members have worn them everywhere from running errands to a Kentucky Derby party.
While the play closed at the beginning of February, the popularity of the Wrolem pants has endured. “It’s funny because I feel like people see them and immediately just become a little obsessed with them,” says Winograd, who was wearing the pants at a matinee showing of Appropriate recently, and was asked about them by the person sitting next to her (Winograd promptly shared the link). When Santos and producer Rachel Karp attended a Gaia Music Collective event together, both showed up in the pants and were asked by numerous people about them. Brown — a lawyer who was not part of the Terce cast but originally noticed the pants on Winograd — has convinced at least one other friend to get a pair and says that several other friends are thinking about it. According to Winograd, Brown now has started her own circle of “pants influence.”
In a scene straight out of theater: One morning after Terce closed, Brown and Karp, who weren’t acquainted at the time, passed each other in Prospect Park, both wearing the pants. “We clocked each other’s pants and we locked eyes,” says Karp. Neither said a word, but Karp messaged the cast’s WhatsApp about it. Meanwhile, Brown texted Winograd that she had seen them on someone at the park. “She was freaking out because they already had a message that said, ‘I just locked eyes with someone who was wearing the pants’,” says Brown. It’s something Santos — the “original pants lady,” as Winograd describes her — can’t wrap her head around. “It’s snowballed out of the quote, ‘main group,’” she says. “It’s crazy.”
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