The Jeans Story -forever in blue jeans

The Golden Days
In 1847 a German named Levi Strauss went to the U.S to follow the Gold Rush to San Francisco. Strauss carried many kinds of fabric to sell to dry good stores, and as business was booming in gold feverish California, Levi Strauss soon became a successful businessman. In 1873 Levi Strauss became partner with a tailor named Jacob Davis. Due to demands from the miners in California for hardwearing work clothes with pockets that did not rip, Strauss and Davis started making copper-riveted denim pants. The tough work pants, known as “waist overalls”, soon became popular and the never-ending story of jeans began.

For a long time jeans were considered work garments and were used as a practical necessity not as a contemporary fashion statement. Gentlemen would not think of wearing jeans. And women did not wear pants at all. Then came the Hollywood cowboys – the tough, cool and strong 1930´s action figures elevated to a cult status in popular Western movies who were all wearing jeans. Infected by severe wild-west fever people headed west for experience on dude ranches and bought the jeans with them back east.

Climbing the Ladder of Taste
During World War 2 there was a decline in the production of “waist overalls” due to restrictions on the use of raw materials. However, jeans were introduced to the world as a symbol of American style and prosperous culture as U.S soldiers often wore them when off duty.

After the war, fashion changed radically. By 1950, Levi’s began selling internationally and other brands such as Lee Coopers and Wranglers emerged competing for market share as the jeans business boomed. Jeans were featured in films and on TV and became a symbol of youth rebellion. With handsome pretty-boy and rebel-without-cause James Dean, denim was back in style. Teenagers loved it, school administrations banned it and in 1958 newspapers reported that about 90 per cent of American youths wore jeans everywhere except in bed and in church. Casual clothing became more and more popular and jeans emerged from work-wear to fashionable leisure garments. In just a decade, denim had climbed the ladder of popularity as a true manifestation of the American Dream and jeans had become the symbol of Western culture and decadence.

Make Jeans Not War
The fun-loving hippie movement embraced denim, and embroidered, painted, patterned, sequinned their jeans. The psychedelic pants were introduced to match the contemporary trend of customizing and personalizing jeans and life. The growing sales, and the former bad reputation, of jeans continued as college kids wore jeans during the 1960’s protest and at the legendary Woodstock music festival in 1969. Just ask your parents. They were there. Wearing jeans. Wearing only jeans.

With the liberalization of the world trade in the 1970’s southern countries sweatshops replaced factories in the North. Due to cheap labour, jeans appeared on city streets in the South. In the North, jeans emerged from the streets as high fashion clothing as the term “designer jeans” was coined in the 1980’s. Calvin Klein, Sergio Valente and Jordache were amongst the first to introduce slimmer and tighter jeans as high fashion garments. A vast number of new labels were introduced as chain stores and fashion houses spotted the trend, thus promoting their own more or less successful lines of jeans.

One Step Back Two Steps Forward
Due to the worldwide recession in the early 1990’s the empire of jeans stopped expanding. Jeans never really became unfashionable, but they fell out of high fashion as the new generation turned to other fabrics and styles such as chinos and sportswear. However, due to the characteristic circular and repetitive nature of fashion, denim was far from dead.

With the new millennium denim got its big comeback, the new generation finally came to their senses and jeans where once again everywhere as an item du jour. From rags to riches. The American Dream. Or as Levis Strauss & Co. Historian Lynn Downey so modestly puts it: “Denim makes our lives easier by making us comfortable, and gives us a little bit of history every time we put it on”. All hail the item du jour, the timeless, the must-have, the never goes out of style, the oh-so-hot-denim. The story of jeans is never-ending.

Foto: Steven Stieng
Modell: Caroline, Anneli (eb models)
Makup: Christine Sørby Johansen
Hair: Alexander Harlem