Men's Indigo Wide Hakama 'Tsuyukusa'

Indigo hakama with a pale blue front tie and gourd embroidery, the workwear cut

Indigo is the colour of Japanese work clothes, and a hakama in it is a work garment: these fall from a wide waistband to the ankle in a deep blue cotton with a slub in the weave, soft pleats at the front, the legs divided high, and a pale blue tie hanging in two tails at the front with a small white gourd embroidered on each. Blue on blue, with the tie a shade lighter than the cloth.

It is the hakama that looks least like a costume and most like a pair of trousers with a good reason for their width, and it is the one that goes with denim, because it is the colour denim was trying to be.

The name, Tsuyukusa, is the dayflower, the small blue flower whose petals Japanese dyers pressed for a blue that faded in a day, and the tie is that blue.

The gourds are embroidered, not printed. The cloth is cotton with a dry, slightly slubbed hand, chosen because trousers this wide need weight to swing and air to breathe, and cotton gives both. It washes cold, hangs, and softens with every wash.

Wear them with a white tee, as in the photograph, or a grey one, and white trainers. The tie wraps once and hangs to the knee. The blue jinbei top from the range over it and you are wearing the whole of a Japanese working wardrobe.

The waistband is wide and firm, the pleats are soft, and the legs swing. The indigo softens with washing and goes a shade paler at the seams first, the way indigo does, which is the way it should.

From across a street they are wide blue trousers with a paler tie. From close the gourds show their stitches, the slub shows in the weave, and the two blues show their difference. They are the hakama for the person who wears blue anyway.

Blue hakama were the working man's version, worn to the fields and the market rather than the castle, and this pair keeps the tone: the cloth has a slub, the tie is a plain colour, and nothing on it pretends to a rank.

It goes with white, with grey, with a black tee, and with the navy jinbei top for the full working wardrobe. It is the hakama for a person who owns a lot of denim and would like something wider.

Sizes run from M to 3XL. It is cut to Asian sizing and runs small, so take one size up from your usual. Between two sizes, take the larger.