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Origins: The sturdy denim was originally a fabric called ‘Serge’ from the city of Nîmes in France. It was called Serge de Nîmes and eventually got shortened to ‘denim’ (de Nîmes). The word ‘jeans’ comes from the French phrase bleu de Genes, meaning the blue of Genoa to indicate the jeans worn by Italian sailors from Genoa that were dyed blue with the Indigo.

Evolution: Jeans was originally worn by slaves who worked in plantations. In 1853, during the SanFrancisco gold mining rush, Levi Strauss started supplying clothes to miners who wanted trousers that would not tear easily. In 1872 Jacob Davis had the idea of using metal rivets to fasten the pockets to the pants and worked out a deal by which Levi Strauss patented it and thus was born the copper riveted Jeans. The ‘Cowboys’ in the Hollywood western movies   popularized Jeans in the 1930s. In the 1950s Jeans became the symbol of teen rebels. In the 1960s the hippie culture brought painted and embroidered Jeans into fashion and soon Jeans became a symbol of western opulence. It is only from the 1970s that Jeans actually became an affordable comfort wear, popular across the world.

Fabric and the Garment: Even though the cotton twill fabric, i.e. Denim, has been almost synonymous with Jeans pants for a long time, both the fabric and the garment have evolved. Jeans is now made with different materials and in different colours and denim has also expanded into other garments like shorts, shirts, jackets, wallets, bags, hats and even parkas . Denim signifies casual, trendy and relaxed fabric and we at Yepme.com think it is an essential fabric in a man’s casual wear wardrobe.