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Finally got my luck for the jacket and jeans

No

Switching from a new pair back to a faded pair always feels off at first

Tilley / Tender Co. x3 / Tezomeya / Hollows / White’s

I’ve read these last few posts a number of times. I like the passion you have for your possessions, I’m a lot less keen on the spurious comparisons and justifications which just aren’t needed. As others have noted, using a potentially overpriced brand to demonstrate good value is unsound; as is trying to extrapolate currency trading values over a long period (nevermind then confusing things further with other countries). Much as I’ve admired fabrics and the ‘look’ of Flat-Head shirts - I find the sizing / cut almost nonsensical. I’m probably the computer designed ‘average’ build … well maybe a bit less so these days … but never have I found a Flat-Head shirt that fits (I’ve tried a few). It tells me a lot that someone of your build needs a 44. One question about that shirt in particular - why do the front yokes and pockets have fabric running in different directions?

I made a detailed review of the J111TS-CH which I think is such a great jacket. This is my second Acronym youtube video after the J1A Comparison that I posted here a while back. There's a quite deep look at TEC SYS in this review and I go into using military modulars as well as Acronym ones like the 3A-MZ5s. One really cool unadvertised thing about this jacket is that the hand pocket lining is sewn in such a way that it basically provides two extra pockets within the lining on each side.

I wouldn't exactly describe myself as having a "passion for my possessions." It's all just stuff that one day will fall apart, or get lost, or stolen, or whatever. But I do spend a lot of time in/using my clothes, which leads to more time observing/thinking about it. I have a nice electric bass that should be much more engaging than my denim jacket or whatever, but I hardly ever use or interact with it at this stage of life, so I'm generally pretty apathetic about it. Same goes for my car, I spend so little time driving that I could never be a "car guy." But I spend a lot of time wearing clothes. I guess to me, it makes sense that I'm going to scrutinize stuff that I use and experience the most. It's more like I'm trying to apply my OCD attention to detail to illuminate some aspects I think are compelling which hopefully leads to making more interesting content than just posting pictures and such. Particularly in this thread where there's not a lot of posting nowadays, I like to think sharing my impressions might give many people on here who have some TFH stuff from back in the day a newfound appreciation for it. Especially when it comes to something like shirts; it feels like there's a ton of stuff out there on minor differences of 501XX jeans from different eras and how accurately/inaccurately particular details are reproduced, or changed. It's not that I don't find this interesting, but it's been pretty thoroughly explored at this point, and I guess I find that scrutinizing other stuff (like on shirts) is more interesting to me, and the justification behind why X shirt costs a lot of money seems to be "it's super heavy and Made In Japan, bro." Obviously I feel like there's a lot more to it than that, and that's what I've touched on a bit here. My polemic (if you can even call it that) is pretty mild compared to some prominent content-creators in the community who often present opinion as fact, and my impressions are based on direct comparison to things I've owned myself. Plus, in the post on the houndstooth shirt, at the end, I did say that this was just my opinion 😉 My interest in the denim hobby had pretty much stalled out until I discovered I could find lots of great stuff from the "golden age" of Flat Head and similar brands on Japanese auction and resale sites for often comically low prices (at least, on occasions when things in my size would come up for sale), in nice condition. Maybe this isn't relevant to everybody out there, but as a married guy with two kids, I don't have as much cash to spend on the clothing hobby as I once did, so I want to make my dollar go as far as it can, and get more for my money. This shouldn't come across as bragging either, as I did nothing special to get this stuff, not even really utilizing my Japanese language skills; I got almost everything through Buyee, an English-language site which consolidates Yahoo Auctions, Mercari, and others into a single proxy, where I just searched for stuff that interested me. I feel this aspect is more analogous to thrift store treasure hunting where finding cool stuff for cheap is part of the fun. Anyway, in regards to sizing, this jacket runs small. Normally I'd wear a 42, which is my size in most TFH tops (though particularly in short sleeves a 40 often fits me just fine.) This is the only TFH thing in size 44 I've ever owned. 42 usually corresponds to a US Medium. Out of the Japanese brands TFH tends to fit me the best since I'm tall and slim, and prefer the western shirts and their detailing, but the "work" style shirts are generally much boxier and fit more like shirts from any other brand. TFH usually made both styles for a given fabric. I find that people are almost universally talking about the western shirts when criticizing Flat Head's cuts. A lot of other brands out there have very short sleeves for my chest/shoulder size, even if I size up, so I appreciate that Flat Head's general design works good for me. That's actually a great question about the pockets and yoke on the houndstooth shirt. The body of the shirt features the fabric at a straight angle, while the pockets and yoke are slanted 45 and -45 degrees, where the left pocket matches the angle of the opposite/right side yoke, and the right pocket/left yoke, vice versa. I think it's probably done like this because it makes the design of the pockets and yoke more visually distinct, whereas if it was all matching the same direction as the body of the shirt it would all blend together. It's pretty normal for flannel shirts to have the pocket fabric at a 45/-45 degree angle, it's just less obvious that's what's going on here because it's a houndstooth fabric instead of a grid-like check pattern.

No flaming intended but I agree, but couldn't put into words as well as Duke. Your passion is infectious and I welcome your regular activity/input but you sometimes portray your opinions as fact with some clear 'prejudice' in your posts. Just enjoy your gear mate and don't over analyse above our already OCD levels of over analysis of jeans and shirts!

Flat Head 6002W Type II jacket. 2.5 months of wear since I bought it used (but with virtually no prior fading.) Color/contrast most accurate in the closeup.

Here’s my Flat Head 6002W denim jacket in size 44. I bought it used off Yahoo Auctions Japan last summer. It showed some slight fading on the front placket, and some broken stitches on the “rectangles”holding down the pleats, but otherwise looked nearly new, with no signs of wear on the arms. The denim felt stiff and crunchy after a cold wash. I’ve put about 2.5 months of actual wear into it, and it’s breaking in pretty much like a fresh jacket would. This jacket is awesome, probably my favorite-fitting denim jacket I’ve worn so far. Thanks to the slightly wide shoulders, the sleeves are actually long enough, which is usually the issue I have with denim jackets. The chest measurement is just right, and the width of the body and sleeves likewise. I wish it was maybe an inch or so shorter in length, but it’s not a big deal. The denim is Flat Head’s usual 14.5 oz, which lends itself well to a denim jacket. The weight is just right, and it’s well suited for pretty much all-season wear, over T-shirts, long sleeves, and flannels. One somewhat surprising detail is the patch sewing. On every other 6002 I’ve seen, the patch is sewn with contrast stitching, the outline clearly visible on the back of the jacket, but this one is sewn with navy thread, making it “invisible” when seen from behind. I’m really curious why this was. Was the patch removed and re-sewn at some point? Why would somebody do that? There’s not actually any indication it was removed or “tampered” with, otherwise the jacket is just like any other TFH denim jackets I’ve seen/handled. I’m not sure exactly when the jacket dates from. It has iron buttons so it’s not from earlier than the late 2000s when TFH switch from coated zinc (?) to their current iron buttons, but this model has been discontinued for a long time, so I’d guess early 2010s. All in all, great jacket, especially for the price I paid (around $130 or so), well below typical for a new denim jacket from a Japanese brand. I’m sure their current production Type IIs are excellent as well, but I especially like stuff from the “original” Flat Head era.

Happy to pay the wholesale price for a j1wb-e without all these spike tapes. Win, win win!

That’s exactly the best thing to do - ask Seiichiro what he has and take it from there. But for what it’s worth a real FW fan should be getting the turned down collar sweater coat …

@silencejoe We need some detailed shots of both garments before they disappear into the black hole that is your apartment 😅

enough garbage from oil and WS wrinkles, bring some more stotz

I want that booklet

L + not rebuilding America + will never make it to the beach + no bridge baby + no DOOMS + no Mads Mikkelsen father figure (literally me btw) + "Hideo Kojima attributes stronger criticism in the US to Americans lacking the 'artistic sensibility' to understand Death Stranding." + not peeing whenever and wherever you want sry bro you just don't got the vision ⚡⚡⚡

One crackhead homeless with a DIY jacket made out of trashbags and ready to stab you

I love that thing but definitely a notch or two too rich of a purchase for an on a whim thing like this.

@AlientoyWorkmachine I’ve really been enjoying them; I’ve probably worn them 3–4 times a week. They’re extremely comfortable, and feel pretty flattering too. They’re already showing significant signs of wear on the thighs, which is a bit of a surprise, having seen how long the woad dyed Type 900 has taken to lighten up. At this rate, I’ll probably be able to post some update photos by the Fall. The Achilles Heel aspect is a turn-off for me, in principle, but I don’t find it to be noticeable on these jeans in practice. The indigo overdye itself is lovely; it’s a little brighter than the woad, and also less consistent. I’ve been leaning into the Tender Co. aesthetic a lot, in general. I have a couple of pairs of non-jeans pants that I wear, but all of my actual jeans have been at least vaguely (and usually not so vaguely) repro style for the last bunch of years, now, so these feel like a pretty big departure from what I’m used to, and from what I think of as my comfort zone. An interesting side effect of wearing these more—or maybe a cause for me being drawn to wear these more—is that, for the first time in years, I’m rarely wearing button up shirts, and am relying in stead on tees and thermals. It’s nice feeling more casual, and it’s definitely more cozy. On the other end of things, I’m noticing my knit tops getting little snags & pulls from everyday life in places where woven shirts wouldn’t. I’ve been speculating with friends as to what middle ground I’ll reach, there.

I might have somethings coming along soon

That is in the 2023 F/W catalogue.

Here’s my Flat Head FNW-61W shirt in size 42, which I recently picked up from eBay. I’d gotten another one of these from Japan a couple months ago, but it was a little small, so I was quite excited when one of these showed up in 42. For me, this is one of the best shirts Flat Head ever made, and that’s saying something. In addition to being a beautiful and impressive shirt in its own right, it’s pretty significant because it was an integral part of early Self Edge history, being one of the first shirts they sold, and featured prominently in their first look book, which you can still see on their site. The way Self Edge and Superfuture adopted this shirt (for instance, Sidney Lo, who prominently wore it in his WAYWT photos) was pretty revolutionary, taking something which had rockabilly vibes in its original context, and basically turning it into streetwear. Of course I was still a few years away from discovering the exciting world of specialty denim back in 2007, but all this ended up being pretty influential in retrospect. The recent Self Edge editorial about the Imperial collab went into all this, and it was pretty insightful since I’d previously been stuck trying to piece it all together from reading old forum threads long after the fact. My own approach is a little different, as I’m generally tucking it in and wearing with engineer boots and leather jackets for more of a “mid-century rancher gone off the rails” vibe, but I really appreciate how such a distinct-looking shirt can be dressed up or down into various styles. The design of this shirt is really great, it has a single yoke pattern and slanted single-button pockets, similar to Flat Head’s 7001 denim shirt. Flat Head also offered this shirt over the years with various combinations of split yoke and sawtooth pockets, as well as a lot of different color combinations, but I think this original iteration, in the Ivory/Black colorway, is the very best. In the past, I owned the circa 2011 split yoke version of this shirt, and the Ivory/Green one. I ended up regretting selling both of them, but this one makes up for it. This shirt has all the goodies you know and love from Flat Head: a custom houndstooth flannel woven on a shuttle loom, 100% cotton stitching, and terrific sewing courtesy of double-needle chain stitching and single-needle accents at the pockets and yoke. It features a ton of felled seams, and selvedge side gussets. I don’t know this for certain but it was probably made by Nakajima Housei, the Gunma prefecture sewing factory that made most of Flat Head’s shirts. The sewing is one of the areas where Flat Head really shines. When you compare to something like an Iron Heart flannel, Flat Head shirts have a distinctly “hand-made” sort of feel, between the vintage machinery and techniques used, and the all-cotton stitching. The double-needle parts of the shirt have a bulge between the stitches, giving a pleasing three-dimensional touch, and the pattern alignment is extremely impressive and well done as well. Flat Head always excels at this, and it’s really on display with a shirt like this, which has such a bold, distinct pattern. The shirt features Flat Head’s “Original Wear” serif name tag at the collar, rather than their shorthorn Western Wear tag, which is maybe a bit surprising, but I think the shorthorn tag was only used for non-flannel shirts, which could explain it. Usually the snaps are branded Universal, but these say Crown; they may be a Universal reproduction of a specific vintage snap. The buttons are a dark mother-of-pearl sort material with a distinct, deep green sheen depending on how the light hits, pretty hard to capture in photographs. This early version had a two-button cuff, while the subsequent iterations over the next couple of years had three. All the buttons snap hard, with no sign of wearing out anytime soon. In 2013 Flat Head redesigned their houndstooth flannel with a bigger pattern, heavier weight, and brushed interior, which made it feel quite similar to an Iron Heart flannel. I owned the Turquoise/Ivory western, which I got when I worked for them in 2013-14. Although exciting at the time, since then I’ve decided that this original iteration was much better and I wish they’d bring it back. If you go back and read the early Flat Head and Self Edge threads it was pretty controversial when a casual shirt showed up costing $150+ and a lot of people weren’t convinced. It seems pretty quaint now, where it’s almost normal in this sphere to spend $350 on a shirt. But in my opinion, this shirt is better designed and more interesting than those pricier new shirts. Here’s my advice if you see one of these shirts come up for sale in your size: get it.

Taken at a house concert last week. Vintage Stetson Stratoliner Black Sign Rising Sun Dunrite belt/vintage buckle Hollows key thingie Companion custom made Paraboot

Cone 55

Thanks for that. I already have sweaters that I like plenty, though, and anyway they tend to go on the outside of shirts or tees—so I’m not sure that they really play into that conversation.

@julian-wolf Interesting stuff, but you've got a sympathizer here. I enjoy repro stuff but have always had a soft spot for, for lack of a better term, less conventional items to mix in. Why I've always been a big fan of Tender. Funny enough, I've been dressing this way for a good long while now and one of the roads it has led me down is a pretty strong aversion to button down shirts - which I've more or less abandoned since 2018. While I enjoy repro cuts and details I have no interest in looking "Western" (at least in the American sense), really at all. A button down with jeans is just generally not my thing. I still have a few solid old Pendleton wool shirts that are nice enough and come out if they're really needed (and I'll try to avoid the jeans if so). So I am a big fan of knits of all kinds, and generally find ways to make up for my avoidance of the collar depending on the occasion. That said, yes, the knits can be susceptible to such things which is why I have a stable of sweatshirts (no sufu brands here) that I'm in for more active times. If it's chilly, paired with merino base you get both worlds of warmth and avoiding the headache of something really nice getting too fouled up - that's the general solution I've had. The Achilles Heel thing is interesting to me, I've certainly got a few pieces that are louder in presentation than the jeans, but I do appreciate that on the jeans it's sort of only "if you know you know" sort of detail.

It’s truly impressive how badly he fucked the J36-WS. Almost as trash as the J1 with the Kraft Single stapled to the front

Fortunately, it doesn't come in my size!

drop b previews now up. j1b description copy never fails to make me laugh. “J1B is built with nodal point weathered drone assassin math. 7 anatomic pockets allow for digital cardboard realism and sub-orbital saturation points. Interopsǽ for frictionless free-market fetishism drugs. Asymmetric DIY 3rd Arm Legba refrigerator. Removable beef noodles franchise vinyl.”

Why just wait a month until this garbage hits 50% off

Yes- mi -> America Apparently from the phonetic use of the Chinese characters/kanji: 亜米利加 (the second character 米 is mi "rice") -> "a mi ri ka". For example: For England: "ei" 英, for Germany it's "doku" 独. Like 耳 mimi -> "ears" which is "selvedge".

Shop descriptions... 😏 "This is a thorough reproduction of the XX model manufactured by DENIME at the time of its founding. The fabric was developed jointly with Kurabo Industries based on recipes from the time. The uneven thread is ring-spun from the same rice cotton used at the time, rope-dyed with a special indigo color, and finished with vegetable dyeing to create a deep texture. A certain DENIME-like color has been reproduced." I was close to ask you guys what "rice cotton" actually is. You can find it nearly on all shops that carry Denime because they all made a simple auto translation (also for some other brands). Actually, it simply means "US cotton" and if you don't translate the whole text but the words themselves, it becomes clear.

I don’t often do double denim but working from home has some benefits. Fullcount/Belafonte

Another lucky pick up of early ‘little e’ 2001s in amazing condition- barely worn. Gulls already deteriorating probably due to age and perhaps less robust paint than they used in later years. Lovely slimline tiger selvedge too.

Aaaannnddd we have buttons. Had to order shorter rivets otherwise I'd have done those this evening. I think my problems with em last night was because they were too long so the post folded over instead of mushrooming out. Also added a picture of the cuffs because I love this charcoal weft. Crazy that these are wearable, didn't think I'd be this far this soon. @reallypeacedoff I used this guide for the buttons: https://imgur.com/gallery/I4wv5UI the buttons are from Dick's Denim on Etsy, and this is the guide he made for his buttons.

The thunderbird design is getting popular - albeit each has been subtly different (jewels, studs and layout) - so Tyler Bryant (of the Shakedown fame) has another: Wickett & Craig harness with nickel plated brass and antique brass hardware; His wife Rebecca (along with her sister) is one half of Larkin Poe who won a Grammy for their album Blood Harmony, so a belt for her: Wickett & Craig bridle with a big ol’ western buckle set and antique nickel hardware;

At last my CSF 1941 s409xxx model have finally been hemmed so they can now return to the rotation of jeans of which l enjoy wearing. @Mr Black did an outstanding job as usual even going so far as to replicate the dual orange/yellow stitching on the original hems. Photos show Og hem off cuts compared to freshly sewn new hems. Compared to the other pair l have (1944 s409xxx) these are much darker but my modern camera phone just can't capture it, even under cloudy skies. Probably due to my lack of understanding of modern phones but anyway you get the general idea.

Molleton 130 Worn on and off for a couple years now. Really love them, and trying to make them my everyday pair or at least in heavy rotation more recently. Such great fabric ❤️

@Cold Summer sandlot-core

Astros / Flat Head / Denime / Warehouse / 70s Chucks

running some cast iron pipe for waste and vent. copper for water that blue collar worker fade going on

Here is a list of the SS24 wholesale collection items, got it from a retailer. I would agree the other 4 pieces are EX but we should have J118 available at retailers based on this list.

Your pair is from 2006 too, see S1 06 in your third photo.

Today I went to a small vintage store where amongst the Zara and H&M jeans there was a pair of unwashed, completely unworn 555 LVC 55 501s and a real pair of Big E 701s!! Super cool to actually find a pair of Big Es in the wild but of course I had to tell the elderly lady who owned the store what she had on her hands, because she had no idea. Also I'm finally the happy owner of a copy of What's The Story on vinyl. The jeans of today are my Sugar Cane 66s which I've been wearing a bit more lately, really easy to dress up and down.

1927 is coming along nicely. Even with a little spray paint action

In September of last year, I joined an experiment aiming to do ultracold atomic physics with titanium. Traditionally, most ultracold experiments use elements from the first and second groups of the periodic table, which are relatively easy candidates for laser trapping and cooling due to their simple electron structure. In certain contexts, this same simplicity limits the types of interactions that can be engineered in the quantum systems that we build, which makes it appealing to look towards preparing ultracold samples of transition metals. This involves some added complication, and the experiment that I recently joined has been actively working towards generating a magneto-optical trap (MOT) of titanium for around 5 years, now. A MOT amounts to a cold (but not yet quantum-degenerate) dilute gas of atoms at a temperature of around 1 mK, and is the first step in most experiments involving ultracold atoms or molecules. As a point of reference, outer space has a temperature of 2.7 K, around 1000 times hotter. Once a cloud of a few hundreds of thousands of atoms is trapped in a MOT, they can be handed off to other more versatile traps and used toward any number of science goals—but most experiments involve this as a first step. In mid-October, we finally observed the world’s first MOT of titanium. This involves two colors of lasers—one at a wavelength of 391 nm, which is invisible to the human eye, and one at 498 nm, which is a beautiful teal color. It's been a pleasure working with this color of light, both from a technical and from an aesthetic perspective, and it's made the pictures very fun to show off. The trapped atoms themselves are the little teal dot in the first and last photos. For these photos, only around 1000 atoms were present, but they were still visible to the naked eye—which is really cool to me.

A new project: penknives, made in England on a brass skeleton with nickel bolsters at each end, a carbon steel blade and scales cut from pear wood from a tree in our garden. Here are some pictures of the making process, at a three-person factory. Here's the timber for the scales (sides of the knife handle), left over from some work done on a ~250 year old pear tree in our garden, that was splitting. The timber was seasoned over four years in a dry woodshed, and then inside for the last year, to stabilise it. The first thing to do is to cut it down to size, on a band saw, first into a thin flat slice, and then into individual bars for the scales: thin brass sheet skeleton pieces are then laid on top, and the scales are drilled through the plate, in the places where the rivets will be: A bolster is a metal piece at the junction between the blade an the handle of a knife. It strengthens the joint and smoothes the shape between the two materials. In kitchen knives it also covers the end grain of wooden scales, which could be unhygienic. In a pocket knife, I was a bit concerned about having sharp corners of wood exposed to knocks, so this knife has an additional bolster at the hilt end. These bolsters are pressed out of nickel, and are drilled through the skeleton as well, on either end of the pear wood scales, keeping everything lined up nice and tightly: here's the matching pair all lined up but not yet fastened together: The bolsters are now soldered in place, to hold everything properly aligned before it's all riveted: Next, the back spring is fitted. Pressed out of steel plate, it's drilled out and profiled to match the handle shape: the blade is a deadstock British Army pattern, made in Sheffield of a mid carbon content steel. Low carbon tarnishes less (stainless), but is relatively soft and doesn't hold a sharp edge well. Too high a carbon content and the blade can be brittle- it's very hard and doesn't blunten, but is difficult to sharpen and not really suitable for a general-purpose pocket knife like this: Here's the knife made up on long rivet pins, not yet fixed in place: but for now, the blade is taken back out, and a piece of steel the same thickness is inserted between the scales to stop anything bending, then the bolster and spring rivets are hammered into place the ends and sides of the scales now get the first, rough, sanding to shape them to the brass skeleton now the blade is slotted into place, and another rivet wire is fitted and snipped off The back of the knife is ground down so that it will all line up flat once it's riveted. At this point the blade hasn't been sharpened, so the following processes aren't quite as risky as they look! The snap of the spring can now be tested and the blade shape adjusted if necessary Now the blade rivet is hammered into place, and the scales are rounded off to match the shape of the nickel bolsters finally, the blade is factory-sharpened on a grindstone and the handle is printed, then it's finished! most knife handles would be sealed, but I preferred to leave the wood with just a light oiling- this way it will darken and take on indigo from jeans pockets, over time. I hope this has been interesting! It's been lovely for me to learn about a new craft, and fun to do a post about it- it's been a while, as most of the production techniques for clothing have been covered earlier in the thread. I've had my own knife a couple of months now, and it's looking lovely. Updates as it evolves.

RMC/WH Work Uniform