Silliest trend: denim connoisseurs.

These days, Mauro is extremely fond of "raw" jeans, made from virgin denim that has never been washed or treated. Four to five days a week, he wears a particular pair of raw jeans. He has been wearing them like this for more than three months and won't even dream of washing them till it's been half a year.

Raw denim is really dark blue and stiff when you first put it on, and in the beginning it tends to bleed onto white sneakers and light-colored couches. But after six months of near-constant wear, Mauro says, the jeans will fit him perfectly and will have faded in all the right places. There will be "whiskering" around his crotch and "honeycombing" behind the knees.

"This jean will be unique to me," Mauro says.

"They kind of show your soul, you know?" says a woman who represents a raw jeans brand.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/16/AR2005081601874_3.html

In those days, there was one wash available – no wash – so you bought your jeans raw and broke them in yourself. You see, back then there was no such thing as industrial laundries, seasonal denim trends or innovative wash techniques. Sounds boring but if you look at what washes are popular these days, they are just poor copies of what used to happen naturally to jeans when you wore them in from raw.

Back in the day, when you began to wear a new pair of jeans, the thick and rigid denim would fold and crease with your body, especially in the groin (cat’s whiskers)and at the back of the knees (honeycomb effect). Where they folded and creased they faded, creating a fading pattern totally unique and personal. The jeans back then were also built to last, so as the jeans naturally aged and became more unique with every wear, they became like a living piece of art, worn and appreciated for years and years.

http://www.imperial.st/rawdenim.html


I'll never go back to washed denim....I think the reason everyone likes the idea of raw denim is because everyone wants to to feel like an individual on this grossly overpopulated planet. We all know that raw denim evolves in a way that is based on the lifestyle of the wearer...this makes it nearly impossible to walk by someone on the street and notice them sporting the same looking jeans...they may look similar...but there will always be some variations....its all about personalization...and raw denim is just a blank canvas for that

http://supertalk.superfuture.com/showthread.php?t=13406&page=2