Entering the term “jeans” into a Google search is a fascinating exercise which reveals much about our priorities these days. Such a search will provide you with the usual suspects on page one in the shape of the retail giants with which we are all familiar. Refining your search for “news” is a much more interesting exercise but one which may leave you feeling a little incredulous.
What News?
I regularly perform this little ritual in the vain hope that I may uncover interesting developments in the world of denim. After all, jeans are the uniform of contemporary life. We all wear them and so at some level we must all be interested in them. New technologies should be leaping off the screen at me and I am particularly interested in innovations that are earth friendly but the truth is these are rather hard to find. I am sure they are out there but they are buried under an avalanche of celebrity gossip.
Style News
Yes! If you search for news on jeans what you get is an endless list of stories about which celebrity has been spotted in skinnies and who favours ripped styles. I am not saying that what the great and the good wear isn’t potentially of interest but I am simply amazed that such side issues should constitute news. I am also quite certain that most of those whose wardrobes are being discussed would appreciate the day that they could step out of their front doors without someone waving a camera at them in order to facilitate a forensic examination of their denim. Vain hope!
Celebrity News
This week, buried under the startling news that Taylor Swift looks good in skinny jeans and that Drew Barrymore has gained wait during her recent pregnancy (shock horror!), there were a couple of noteworthy stories for those who were prepared to look hard enough.
The Real News
British company Maple Jeans has broken records on crowd funding site Kickstarter in their attempts to raise the necessary capital to expand their British made product offering. This doesn’t seem too amazing at first glance but delve a little deeper and you discover that this is an organisation that is attempting to raise the profile of British manufacturing and to create new jobs in the clothing industry which has largely emigrated to the Far East. Three cheers for that project then!
I also discovered that Betabrand are working with anti-virus firm Norton to develop a new pair of jeans. This may seem like a strange collaboration but turns out to be a sign of the times. Our wardrobes need to keep up with technology and contactless payment cards and passports are presenting new opportunities for cybercrime. Radio frequency identification (RFID) tagged items can be hacked but the new silver based material in the Betabrand jeans will block the wireless signals. I feel safer already!
Gosh things have moved a bit since good old Levi Strauss gave the world jeans. Levi’s are still a great choice but now jeans do all sorts of things including getting you onto page one of Google (if you already happen to be famous), creating jobs in Britain and preventing cyber crime. What will I uncover the next time I explore denim news?
Article by Sally Stacey