For many people, khakis have become a happy medium. Some retail analysts predict that over the next ten years, khakis will become as popular as jeans. In our tests for this report, we concentrated on men's and women's all-cotton washable khakis, the most widely sold type, with a pleated front, a relaxed fit, and no cuffs. Some have a wrinkle-resistant finish, identified in their name or on their hangtag. Other key findings follow.
Basics tells what to look for when buying any pair of khakis.
The women's J.C. Penney Authentic St. John's Bay pants, left, are made of unfinished cotton, but they came out of the dryer looking almost as tidy as the wrinkle-resistant Lee Casuals , right. We washed and dried the khakis five times. After the last laundering, we removed them from the dryer promptly, let them hang for at least an hour, then examined them. On the whole, wrinkle-resistant pants did look smoother. The Haggar, Savane, and Eddie Bauer wrinkle-resistant men's pants looked neat as new, and almost all the rest would have required little or no ironing.