The Casually Dignified Allure of Double Denim

There wasn't a store I visited last week that didn't have mannequins draped in America's most cherished cloth.

A classic tuxedo has little use in our day-to-day lives. But a Texan or Canadian tux would look smart in any case except the office and wherever a traditional one would be expected. And even that could be up for debate; Justin Timberlake decided when he hit the 2001 American Music Awards red carpet with Brittney Spears, clad in patchwork denim by Steven Gerstein. Or Riff Raff, more garish, in his and Katy Perry's 2014 homage to Timberlake and Spears's look. And many a celebrity since.

It’s a beloved and history-steeped fabric, denim. No textile has proven more versatile while retaining as distinguishable a hand as it has. To be sure, fashion is replete with cotton weaves. It’s why, according to the Textile Exchange's most recent Materials Market Report, the plant accounts for nearly a quarter of global fiber production, making it "the second most important fiber in terms of volume". Retailers will blend it with cheaper ones (like polyester, the most commonly used fiber globally), often for no other reason than to get us to shell out more dollars for a product than it’s worth. But whether a blue-hued garment is a hundred per cent cotton or has more plastic than plant in its makeup, other weaves have little in the way of compositional difference than America's most treasured twill. 

In a Corporate Lunch podcast episode, men's

fashion writer Samuel Hine said that wearing your jeans (particularly Levi's) to death should be a real source of pride for a wearer. A rip, wrinkle, or any other material evidence of wear is what imbues a garment with meaning. And it's that wear and tear that is so central to the story of denim and why it remains near and dear to many Americans’ hearts.

But its history predates that of Levi Strauss.

The word 'denim' strings from the French expression serge de Nîmes (a twill-woven, silk and fleece-blended fabric made in and named after the French city Nîmes). Jeans, at first referring to a more lightweight cotton, and for which denim is most commonly used, get their name from the French word Gênes (referring to Genoa, Italy, where the first ones were made). Deriving their original color from the Indigo plant of India, these pants were initially supplied for Italian mariners whose boiler suits would eventually coarsen through the production of calico overalls (or dungarees, primarily made in Mumbai's Dongri). Denim's weft, which undergoes two-plus twists, provides a strength distinct from other twill weaves that many blue-collar folks have found effective while at work. And by the 1700's, the fabric began putting roots down in America as a workman's cloth. A century later, Levi Strauss, himself an agriculture worker, partnered with tailor Jacob Davis to supply other gold excavators with denim garments to wear to work during The Gold Rush.

In Sustainability in Denim, S.G. Grace Annapoorani notes that Levi's jeans "were produced using sturdy material and fortified with bolts at the spots where jeans tended to tear, which extended the life-time of the jeans." This is why Sam was so proud that he had worn his until they were on their last legs. And how, when our jeans become torn, the imperfections feel right, anticipated. Once a pair of chinos rip, they might be relegated to hiking, gardening or house painting. But that's where jeans get their efficacy. When they begin to have something to say outside the maker's intention.

America's soft spot for the manual worker is indelible to our appreciation for the fabric, but it wouldn't be such a mainstay had it not reached other facets of culture. We have 1930's and 50's Hollywood to credit for the depictions of cowboys and rebellious youth that the mention of denim styles tend to conjure up; Hip-hop for giving them a swagger, suaveness and polish; and skaters for making jeans look and feel lax but also gripping and exposing. Brands specializing in denim, brands with the word denim in them (like Tremaine Emory's Denim Tears), and brands that make off-the-rack black and blue denim trench coats have sprung up. Designers of fashion's upper echelon have even constructed garments out of it and shown them as couture.

Recently, contemporary labels seem won over by denim doubled, like blue jeans and a matching button-up or jacket - the Canadian tuxedo. But it was the Washington-born singer and actor Harry Lillis "Bing" Crosby Jr. who fashioned the look. Levi Strauss & Co. sent Crosby a custom denim tuxedo after he was denied entry into a Canadian hotel because of his attire. And, to keep this from happening anywhere else, the company added a leather patch to the jacket's interior that read "Notice to All Hotel Men."

The original tuxedo of The Great White North has been modernized and, really, casualized over time. The ensemble now often consists of pants and a jacket cut from the same cloth (not the same yard of fabric per se, just that the whole look is denim). Dries Van Noten's Autumn/Winter 2024 Menswear collection, which just hit stores, included impeccably tailored suiting that errs on the side of Crosby. Rhude offered up something more upbeat and familiar, as did Skall Studio during Copenhagen Fashion Week: a denim jacket and generously proportioned jeans to match. Each look featured a collar upturned - slightly or entirely - which a lot of us are doing to make our shirts feel more punchy than preppy.

Hugo Boss, Ralph Lauren, and Vivienne Westwood also have mannequins merchandised in all denim of various shades in window displays and on shop floors. I don't own any denim jackets (trucker styles tend to be too short and protruding in the back for my liking, and denim blazers aren't that popular), so my tux is a button-up with wide-leg jeans. When I want to feel "correct", which isn't very often, I put on one of my two slim-fits. And just as one might wear a tee or thinner button-up underneath their denim shirt, jacket, or shacket, a blazer can be worn over it — thanks Ralph.