Today is official birthday of jeans

To be precise, patent #139121, registered by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, was for the production of "strapless work overalls with pockets for a knife, money, and watch." Belgian immigrant Leiba Strauss (later Levi Strauss), who arrived in the United States in 1853, had been making such pants from canvas for two decades. Firstly, canvas was the most durable of all existing fabrics, and secondly, the sailing fleet was dying out, and supplies of the material from which sails were made could be bought quite cheaply.

Over the years, the pants were improved, based on practical considerations - which is what later made them clothing "for centuries." Strauss sold his products primarily to gold prospectors, and therefore redesigned the "model" to suit their requirements. This is how the extra strong double stitching, large front and back pockets, not side pockets like in regular trousers, appeared. There was even a small pocket in the front, which until recently was a must for the classic cut of jeans - Strauss invented it for a pocket watch.

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The next fundamental know-how was invented not by Strauss, but by Jacob Davis (Jacob Jofis, an emigrant from Riga). Since, as has already been said, jeans were purely work pants, in the pockets of which they carried anything, even strong threads from the double seam would fall apart under their weight. It was Jacob Davis, also a tailor, who bought fittings from Strauss, who came up with the idea of ​​reinforcing the pockets with rivets. And in 1886, the well-known leather label with two horses that cannot tear jeans appeared.

In order to describe the further evolution of jeans and, most importantly, their role in modern culture, one could write a book. Let's note two main stages. Firstly, jeans turned from workwear into youth wear. In the West, this happened in the late 50s and early 60s. And secondly, Calvin Klein, having created his famous Calvin Klein jeans in 1978, was the first to bring models in them to the catwalk.

This is how a real revolution began in the "jeans world", which led to the emergence of dozens, if not hundreds, of brands - and in the 70s of the last century, as was said above, they could be counted on the fingers. It is not for nothing that by 1990, the company Levi Strauss & Co., owned by the heirs of Levi Strauss, lost half of the market, and five years later reduced production by another third.

However, the legend remained a legend, and in 1999, Time magazine called Levi’s 501 jeans, which the company began producing in 1920, “the fashion item of the century.”

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