Swedish Style Diary: Of Food and Fashion

I love thinking about the parallels between the food and fashion industries, but Karin Stenmar of Dem Collective took it a little too far.

Sitting in her office in Stockholm, in a sun-filled old church with soaring ceilings, she picked up a pair of her brand’s new jeans, and told me I could eat them. 

I politely declined, having had my share of muesli and yogurt that morning.

“There’s no chemicals at all,” said the bespectacled blonde, as if the presence of additives kept me from snacking on the pants.

Food is very much a part of Dem Collective’s concept. When Steinmar was on vacation in Jamaica (how innocently these stories begin!), she learned about Ital Food–imagine a Rastafari pronouncing “vital food,” and you’ll hear the derivation. Ital Food is a religious diet tradition that focuses on pure, natural ingredients. So why, Karin wondered, did she see so many Jamaicans eating instant American macaroni and cheese? 

Karin Steinmar

The short answer is not because it’s the cheesiest, but because it’s cheap. But as Karin continued to think macaroni she realized the Rastafaris had abandoned their traditions not just out of thrift, or financial necessity, but also out of addiction to the fat and sugar.

It’s the same thing in fashion, she said, and that’s why the company is called Don’t Eat Macaroni. 

“H&M, for example, they are making people addicted to cheap garments,” she said, invoking the name of the fast fashion giant omnipresent in every conversation I’ve had in Sweden regarding fashion and sustainability. I’m going to meet a press officer at H&M’s headquarters, so I’ll do my very best to get their take on this idea.

I’ve got my own ideas, and lots more to tell you about Dem Collective, but for the moment, I’m trying to sponge up as many ingredients as I can. We can synthesize the soup back in New York.

Denim at DENIM

The search for authenticity continues at DENIM, a new exhibit at NYU’s 80 WSE Gallery. I wore my vintage Calvins to the opening, and wrote about what I found there for Dossier.

Esprit de Corps, Rob Pruitt

Pricing That Perfect Pair

I’m not the only who appreciates the value of finding the perfect pair of jeans.

As Guy Trebay wrote in today’s Times Style Section, for men of a certain age, the right jeans can make the difference between looking classy and classic (á la Harrison Ford in the Extraordinary Measures poster) or a little embarrassing (more like Ted Danson in “Cheers,” Trebay suggested).

I recently had lunch with another newspaper man of a certain age, my friend David. He describes himself as “fashion-impaired,” but he’s mastered the art of exactly what Trebay observed so many men fail at. That day, he wore black jeans, as he usually does, faded to a stony shade of graphite (not unlike his goatee).

As he describes them, his black jeans make “his bottom half invisible” whether with a coat and tie or an old faded band tee-shirt, and always with decal-free black Reeboks. This uniform, which suits him well, frees him from the daily burden of wondering what to wear.

“So what’s that worth?” he asked me.

“A lot,” I replied. (Indeed, after a particularly harrowing morning getting dressed, I would have forked over a pretty penny for a pair to render my own bottom half invisible–but that’s another story.)

black jeans by Hugo Boss

The black jeans David wore that day represented his first foray into the world of $100 denim–$110, actually. His wife convinced him to buy them two and a half years ago, and he has worn them pretty much every day since, removing them only to wash on the weekends.

Prior to those Boss jeans, his routine involved rotating two pairs of the Gap’s $40 version all week. They would last a year–meaning worn everyday, they would last six months before looking too tired (busted pockets, etc.) for work.

Those Boss jeans, on the other hand, at 5 days per week, have lasted two-and-a-half years. Using one of my favorite methods for calculating cost, the “price-per-wear,” they’re actually the better investment. The Gap pair maxed out (at least for work purposes) after about 182 wears. At $40, that means at their cheapest, David’s price was about 22 cents per wear. The Boss jeans, however, at 650 wears, now cost about 17 cents per wear. I’m no economist, but I think they call this amortization. If they last another year, he’ll be down to 12 cents per wear. (On the other hand, if he only wore them once, that would have been a $110 wear–see?) And they’re fitting and fading quite nicely.

“They are perfect,” he said.

And at this rate, if he keeps on wearing them, they’ll soon be verging on priceless.

What Would Levi’s Do?

Jeff Jarvis is constantly asking us, What Would Google Do?  Now, as Google threatens to leave China, this piece in today’s WSJ finds a precedent in Levi’s tenuous trade relationship with the country, comparing this moment to the denim company’s exit in 1993 . (They have since returned.) From the article:

“If you look at the Levi Strauss and Google situations,it’s important to see there are similarities but there are differences,” said Sharon Hom, a spokeswoman for the group Human Rights In China. “The impact is much bigger today because it is making it into a public debate in China. Not everyone needs a pair of jeans but everyone needs information.”

So is Google the new Levi’s? Is information the new denim?

Where does that leave information about denim?

No Logo + The Value of Nothing: Naomi Klein and Raj Patel

Last night I went to hear Naomi Klein and Raj Patel speak at the New York Society for Ethical Culture. I was interested in their books, particularly Klein’s No Logo (originally published 10 years ago) and Patel’s The Value of Nothing, which just hit the bestseller list, and, of course, how their ideas might apply to clothing. 

As soon as I sat down, I  was reminded of this great cultural moment in conscious consumerism, when I heard this unmistakeable voice over my shoulder.

Wallace Shawn, who plays the wily Sicilian from The Princess Bride, and also happens to be a writer, was sitting behind me. But as you might imagine, the lightheartedness pretty much ended there. 

Amy Goodman moderated the discussion, much of which hinged on the devastating earthquake in Haiti. and how we’re likely to see the theories set forth in Patel and Klein’s books (particularly Klein’s Shock Doctrine) at work in the coming months. 

Patel is a smooth talker who uses simple metaphors to explain his ideas, many of which hinge on debt as a means of subjugation, and also on hunger. “I always come back to food,” he said.

To explain the basis for The Value of Nothing, he talked about the real value of a $4 hamburger, as he did on the Colbert Report, lamenting that the price of a burger does not account for what’s lost in creating it (ie: the environmental cost of losing biodiversity and carbon sucking trees for the pasture could be worth $200 alone, and one fifth of American’s health care dollars go to treating diabetes.) Patel said lots of the same things last night as he did when he appeared on the Colbert Report (and was also wearing the same eggplant-colored velvet jacket) but honestly, I’m still trying to figure out the solution he proposes to the flawed free market, as it seems Colbert was too, when he ran out of time (see here.)

Is it Socialism? I’m not sure, but the first chapter of the book is available online for further investigation. I like that Colbert steered the consumption model toward clothing on his segment, using his own tie as an example, instead of that same old food analog. He doesn’t talk so much about the “real cost” of clothing as he does the vicious cycle of what Klein called the part-time economy in No Logo, using Wal-Mart as an example of a company that remains uncommitted to their employees, paying them so little they can barely afford to shop there–what Colbert jokingly calls the free market “Circle of Life.”

Klein, ahead of the curve, used clothing ten years ago in No Logo to explain what we’ve now come to know as our service economy, where we don’t manufacture tangible things so much as we build brands. (And what, I wonder, would Mr. Patel say, is the value of a brand?)

image from Gen XYZ: Who Are We?

I noticed when Ms. Klein stood up, that there was actually a logo on the stage. It was small, dark red, sewn onto the back of her jeans and I am pretty sure it said, “Citizens of Humanity.” I’m not referring to a political patch, but rather to an identifying marker of ironically-named designer denim.

As I said, I can’t be sure that they were Citizens (their resemblance to Seven for All Mankind jeans might be seen as a weakness of the brand), but it would be interesting to learn what someone like Ms. Klein, an activist who knows so incredibly much about all the economic and social forces at play in clothing marketing and manufacturing, but also looks pretty and polished, decides what to wear. 

The Denim Diaries: Part 3

Jeans are an essential piece of the California uniform, so I wanted to make sure I would have at least a couple of reliable pairs with me for my trip. The week before I left, my Earnest Sewns got another rip in the very top of the right thigh–which is where all my jeans seem to rip.

Earnest Sewn, Decca Straight Leg Sample

Because I got them at a sample sale, I can’t really claim this says anything about the quality (it may actually say more about the strain that my holiday indulgences have put my jeans under.) Anyway, I got them fixed at the New York Tailor Shop on Kenmare before my trip. They told me they patch holes in crotches of stretchy jeans every single day, and that they’re going to keep on ripping. But for the moment, I was happier with the investment of $8 and the time it took to drop off/pick up the pants than the idea of scouting out  a new pair of jeans.

So I packed my newly patched Earnest Sewns along with a pair of J Brand Scarlett Seven Eights jeans I got at Anthropologie last May into my suitcase for California.

It was news to me that these Scarlett jeans were marketed as “curvy fit” jeans until I just had a look at J Brand’s website, but it makes sense. Usually when I buy jeans to fit my backside, they gape at my waist. Or if buy them to fit my waist, they are outrageously tight everywhere else.

But not these–they fit my butt and my waist, and it’s likely because of that contoured waistband J Brand is touting on their website. That, of course, and a bit of stretch. I was surprised to see the content label say these have just 2% stretch, cause it feels like much more. The “Seven Eights” refers to the length, which is a good little capri length for shorties like me.

That shorter length makes them cute with espadrilles, which is what I was wearing yesterday when we took the California Christmas to another level, and went to see Avatar at the 3-D IMAX in Irvine. (So awesome!!) I ran to the ladies room before the film was about to begin, and when I went to zip my jeans…nada. I tugged and tugged to no avail. And this was not due to too many Christmas cookies, if that’s what you’re thinking. They buttoned up, no problem, but the zipper would not budge.

Luckily, the Laloo tee (purchased at the Steven Alan sample sale) and Edun cardigan (pictured here) I had on covered the open zipper, so it didn’t steal the thunder from my 3-D glasses, which provided an ample dose of wardrobe-related embarassment for the day.

One day later, that zipper still isn’t moving. It’s as if my denim supply is some sort of closed energy system, where once one pair is patched and back in action, another must become eliminated. Sounds sort of James Cameron, right? I just hope it doesn’t require an Avatar-sized budget and schedule to solve this, but I suspect we might be at the outset of a major project here.

Stay tuned…

Update: Retail and Restoration

You may remember how disappointed I was last month when I came across this on a restorative walk through SoHo.

One of my favorite vintage haunts, Sweet Tater, had closed. I’ve since received emails from both of the Sweet Tater tots, Sarah and Christina, telling me where to find their wares. Sarah sells her vintage denim, shoes, and coats at Artists and Fleas every Saturday in Williamsburg, and Christina has opened a lovely shop, Portia & Manny, on Elizabeth Street in Nolita.

Portia & Manny, 198 Elizabeth Street

My sister, not usually one for vintage, picked up a pair of ’70s wide-leg jeans at Portia & Manny when she visited from Australia a few weeks ago. They’re made of nice sturdy denim, but are thin and loose enough to be comfortable for the summer Down Under. There she is in her front yard. 

I would be tempted to see if there’s a sister pair at Portia & Manny with my name on them, but the lovely thing about having a sister in the Southern Hemisphere is that we have our summer clothes on a time share. Maybe when Sara packs up the sundresses in May, maybe she’ll put those pretty pants in the box for me too. 

The Denim Diaries: Part 2

Well, it seems I’m not alone in my endless fascination with denim, and the industry is certainly providing plenty of material (forgive) to work with. And I’m not the only one. Today, one half of a seemingly life-sized denim-dressed backside, is gracing the front of The New York Times’ style section.

The story touches on the often arbitrary nature of pricing jeans, which sounds like it has more to do with what the market will bear than with the actual cost of production. Maybe that’s why I’m wearing leggings today, rather than my J Brand jeans (pictured above) which The New York Tailor Shop is patching up for me–yet again.

Jesus, who works at the Tailor Shop, along with his brother and his dad, said they get jeans with holes at the nexus (read: crotch), like mine everyday.

I loved J Brands when they emerged–they filled a hole (again, forgive) in the market for a clean, dark, straight jean with a bit of stretch. I bought one pair, and then a second. They became my everyday jeans. When I wore them to work my first week for Rogan, another denim designer, he gave me a once over and called me a “sucker.” At the time I thought he was bruised that I wasn’t wearing his jeans (flattered that he cared), but I’m beginning to wonder if he was right.

When I asked one of the guys working the floor at Barney’s Co-op whether he got a lot of returns on J Brands for these holes at the crotch, he said “tons,” but he thinks they’re getting better. I actually fear they’ve gotten worse. The pair pictured above is my second one, and it’s getting a little overwhelming in the patch department. They’re starting to look like padded bike shorts. Not sexy. (For $158, they can’t last a year?)

It’s funny, in that New York Times story today, Jeff Rudes, a J Brand founder, says that $200 jeans were “just a fad,” and goes on to say that “the floors at most of the major stores were so overassorted that they almost looked like Loehmann’s.” Yet, on J Brand’s website, there are no less than 178 permutations to choose from–some of which appear dark, clean, sexy, and straight, just the way I like them. (Yes, we’re still talking about jeans.)

If I had any indication the price tag had some bearing on quality and durability, I just might consider purchasing a pair. But between my hole-patching fund and that story in The Times I may have to continue the hunt–just so I don’t feel like a sucker.

The Denim Diaries: Part 1

I know I’m the consumer here, but sometimes I find myself completely consumed by the process. I’ll give you an example: jeans. Finding the perfect pair is no new obsession of mine. Actually, the first article I ever published was devoted to the topic. To me, jeans are very personal, and because they’re the mainstay of many an outfit, I’ve got to feel absolutely comfortable in them. And I don’t just mean that the fabric feels good against my skin, though that’s important too. I’ve got to feel like they look good. But let’s be honest, there are enough articles devoted to that topic.

What concerns me today is the question of durability.

Exhibit A: Loomstate jeans purchased at Steven Alan in the fall/winter of 2005

Jeans, in my mind, are sort of like the Golden Retriever of one’s wardrobe. They should be loyal, comfortable, handsome, tough, and love you unconditionally. (Some fortunate souls may have even found these qualities in a mate, but let’s not lose focus.)

I favor clean dark jeans, with no “designer” stitching on the back pockets and no pre-manufactured crease-lines on the front (in the business they call those “whiskers”). That’s what I had in mind when I purchased the above pictured Loomstate jeans a few years ago. I had been searching far and wide for a dark subtly bootcut pair and settled on these–partially because I liked what I had read about Rogan Gregory, the company’s co-founder, and their use of organic cotton. This was before I worked for Rogan at Edun and shared an office with the lovable folks at Loomstate in 2006, and it was also before Steven Alan was my friend–full disclosure here, folks.

Believe it or not, those babies were once a uniform dark indigo, sort of like this pair. All those whiskers were hard-earned, as were the rips in the knees…and these in the crotch. (If anyone knows a more attractive word for crotch, I’d love to learn it. Leave a comment.)

Although I would have preferred that they last an eternity without ripping, I was sort of okay with the way they wore. I’m hard on my clothes, especially shoes, jeans, and bags. This is New York, folks. And when I’m not here, I often find myself on farms, and the jeans go there too.

As instructed, I refrained from washing them too often, though I didn’t wear them in bathtub–that’s just silly. I dried them in the sun when I was in New Zealand, and in the dryer when I was in New York.

The denim got really soft, and they faded and broke in in such a way that some people pay extra for. So, for about $168 at a local retailer I got a pair of organic cotton jeans, made in the U.S.A. (of imported fabric–more on this later) that stayed dark and a little dressier for about a year before they began to decompose into the very casual pair you see today. I’ll have to get that latest rip in the knee patched if I’m going to keep them going through the winter, but there’s a question here about when to let go. Maybe when the patches outweigh the original pants, it’s time.

This was only Chapter 1 in a long denim diary. When these jeans ceased to fill my dark denim requirement, I set out searching for another pair. More to come.