Ripped Jeans Denims
are Popular
A
reader wonders if ripped jeans will ever go out of style. Our fashion critic
offers insight into the future of distressed denim.
Ripped
jeans, which initially seemed to be a fad, have now been popular for at least
10 years. People wear them to dinner in upscale restaurants as well as for
doing yard work. Do you foresee a demise any time soon, or is this style now a
part of fashion forever? — Connie, Marblehead, Mass.
Forget
10 years. Pre-ripped jeans, because that is what we are talking about, really —
the kind of wear and tear that is artfully, or not so artfully, designed into
denim, as opposed to the kind of wear and tear that happens over time — have
been with us for more than three decades.
Their
popularity has surged and waned, but ever since designers appropriated the
signifiers of workwear, punk and hippie garb and offered them as fashion
statements, these ripped-for-you jeans have never entirely gone away. They
simply became known as “distressed denim.”
While
you can argue the inauthenticity of buying your distress rather than creating
it yourself, you can’t argue with designers’ ability to leverage the human
desire for shortcuts, or fashion’s fundamental skill at absorbing the trappings
of the underground and turning them into style.
“I
don’t see ripped jeans going anywhere soon,” Benjamin Talley Smith said when I
asked. Presumably he would know, since he is a denim specialist who has worked
on the jeans lines of numerous brands, including Khaite, Walmart and Rag & Bone, and who haunts the flea
markets of Los Angeles looking for old jeans with special lines of wear and
tear for contemporary inspiration.
“If
anything,” he said, “I feel the resurgence of more destroyed jeans in the
premium and luxury market.”
As
to why, it may have something to do with the current vogue for all things 1990s
and 2000s, the original heyday of mass market distressed denim. It may also
have something to do with the deterioration of dress codes in the post-lockdown
world, the blurring of lines between work and play, and the way erstwhile
weekend clothing can be dressed up just enough to go pretty much anywhere. Not
to mention the discussion around sustainability and upcycling.
Then,
too, it probably has something to do with the allure of a garment that seems to
tell a story of a life well lived, and the universality of the language of
denim.
Still,
not all ripped jeans are created equal, and there are certain clear tells that
reveal whether the distressing comes from a machine or could legitimately be
attributed to actual wear.
“You
can tell a good destruction pattern based on a few things,” Mr. Talley Smith
said. “If the fill yarns” — yarns that go across the hole — “are partially
broken, that is a sign of authentic damage. If you see blue fuzzy around the
hole, it means the holes were made after the jeans were finished.”
Other
giveaways per Mr. Talley Smith: “The holes are in natural wear locations like
the knees, coin pocket, back pocket or just below the front pocket scoops,”
which is good, or the rips are too even or too symmetrical, which is bad.
Indeed,
in what may be a supreme example of fashion irony, the more distinctive the
ripping, the more expensive the jeans. This can be because the jeans are being
used as a meta-commentary on old ideas of status and consumption, as with Balenciaga.
Or it can be because, in the drama and artistry of their shredding, the
scarification of their weft, the ripped jeans have more in common with couture
one-offs than, say, “Flashdance” (and come with the
price tags to match).
See,
for example, the work of Glenn Martens at Diesel, where the designer has turned
upcycling into a kind of creative laboratory of lasering, plasticizing and
otherwise rendering old denim practically unrecognizable. Or see the draped
threads, patched with lace, sequins and other found materials of Who Decides
War, the New York label founded by Ev Bravado and
Tela D’Amore. Who Decides War has developed a cult
following in part because it posits damage and destruction as a route to beauty
and because the designers understand that denim may be the best way to convey
that idea.
It
is, they wrote in an email, “an American staple, and a blank canvas with
limitless possibilities.” One that really does withstand the test of time.
Your
Style Questions, Answered
Every
week on Open Thread, Vanessa will answer a reader’s fashion-related question,
which you can send to her anytime via email or Twitter. Questions are edited
and condensed.
Vanessa
Friedman has been the fashion director and chief fashion critic for The Times
since 2014. More about Vanessa Friedman
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