Review: L’eggs Silken Mist Run Resitant Ultra Sheer

A new varation of nylon / lycra fiber has hit the market that is being billed as “run resistant”. L’eggs Silken Mist is the first widely available pantyhose in the states to utilize this new yarn and weaving technique. It’s touted as being sheer, silky, and incredibly durable.  Naturally, at Hosiery Review, we had to test these claims.

I picked up a pair of the L’eggs Silken Mist for $3.78.  At this price, my expectations are not terribly high. I bought them in “black mist” Ultra Sheer Leg style.  I’ve yet to encounter an off-black variant that I’m really crazy about.  They usually end up looking grey or an odd taupey-grey.  This pair was the latter, and although not a deal breaker, you do want to be careful what colors you wear them with, as this is not a color-neutral fabric. It leans to the warm side of grey.

Construction features were as expected: a control top panty,  sheer toe, and conventional “round” seams (as opposed to the more luxurious flat seams in higher end hosiery). The control top panty was actually quite comfortable. It provided some degree of firmness, but it was nothing I felt the need to escape from.

Going on, they stretched to a very sheer consistency. L’eggs doesn’t ever specify a denier rating for their products, but I’m going to estimate these around 12 denier. This is a very sheer yarn; for the first time I was actually looking forward to getting a run in them to see how they’d handle it. To the touch, they were very silky, i’d give them 8/10.  When rubbing your legs together, though, they showed a very different characteristic, being a bit rough. Leg to leg silkiness is  5/10 .   They were just a tad bit matte in terms of sheen. The weave is very fine and this pair really seemed to want to disappear into my legs. I’m guessing that a nude pair of these would truly disappear and look very natural on one’s legs.

I wore them to a party, a bar, and an afterparty, wondering when they would meet their fate.  I ressisted the temptation to stick a ball point pen through them in the name of science. It wasn’t until the wee hours of the night, right before going to bed, that I discovered a very small hole in the toe area of one foot. I am guessing that it developed from walking around barefoot sans shoes on some rough antique wood flooring. At last, a hole! In almost any other pair of pantyhose (especially this cheap and sheer), a run (or “ladder”, as they call it in europe) would have screamed skyward up my leg. True to their promise, this run really did resist expanding. Of course, one could easily force it to run, but let’s keep in mind: any hole that doesn’t explode into a 24″ run is kind of a miracle of science.  It remained about 1″ long. I dabbed a small drop of clear nail polish on it and I’m certain this pair will be more than sturdy enough for another night on the town.

Summary:  I think this is a wonderful utilitarian pair of pantyhose. They look rather elegant, they feel very silky to the touch, and if they were just more pleasant when rubbing one’s legs together, I’d be incredibly stoked on this new revision of the Silken Mist line.  At an initial cost of $3.78, they are on the better side of average for cost-per-wearing.  Overall, I give L’eggs Silken Mist Run Resistant Ultra Sheer Leg a 7 / 10.