Cold Summer

I wonder when they did that? Back when I worked for TFH in 2013 and part of 2014, it was just White's and Viberg. Maybe Wesco came after.

Interesting, I didn't know Flat Head ever made anything with Wesco - just White's and Viberg.

I actually think my legs look fine. I just look like a dork in shorts.

I think 70s Chucks are the sweet spot for heritage-style sneakers. They feel as nice to me as Japanese sneakers I've handled, and are made from excellent materials, but way cheaper. Obviously, I was there was a more ethically-manufactured version available My biggest issue with the 70s Chuck is the fit, the heel seems way too big to me. A snugger-heeled 70s Chuck would be just about perfect.

Yep, I do - I love mine, they're great shoes. Very versatile. I wear mine all the time, though probably less often once the weather warms up.

1001s look wonderful. I think I prefer your TCB 50s a little more, and the banner denim looks similar enough to the 13.7 oz denim on my Full Counts that maybe now I don't feel so bad about not being able to get 1001s. What's the wear time/wash rundown on these?

I never put any stuff in my front pockets on any jeans, hate how it feels and fades... but I put my hands in my pockets all the time. They have to go somewhere, right? So I find it really annoying when the front pockets are too small for me to stick my hands in.

Interesting, which Warehouse did you wear? From what I've seen, the 800's denim looks similar to the TCB 50s, while the Banner denim on the 1001 et al is more like Full Count and other vintage-accurate fabrics.

Stunning fades Jared... the texture, the contrast, everything about these is just perfect.

I actually have warmed up a lot to the vintage 501 aesthetic over the years - I follow a number of Japanese guys on Insta who wear vintage jeans and really like the look. I guess I just don't feel as compelled to get something as "exact" in replicating those vintage jeans - I feel like the WH 1001, FC 1101/1108, TCB 50s, SC 1947 etc. are good enough for my tastes. Guess I'm not too hard to please.

For really old jeans (30s and earlier) I kinda get the appeal. Things like the crotch rivet (a feature I'd love to be standard on all jeans, actually ), buckle back, waistband buttons, etc. are noticeably different from "standard" jeans. But the differences between the various 1940s 501s can seem like splitting hairs to me... but clearly lots of people are into it. I also get it if a specific year's fit just works better for your body than others, that sort of thing. I do think the imperfect "quirks" add character to garments - my FH 3005s have a defect where the selvedge is extremely narrow halfway down the thigh. It's only visible when the jeans are inside out, and it doesn't really affect anything, durability-wise. It just offers a bit of insight into the fact that even high-quality Japanese craftsmanship isn't perfect, and I kind of like that. And when stitches bust and need to be repaired, I don't get mad, I see it more as an opportunity to fix and make the jeans more uniquely "mine." But to me, the big difference between this example and something like what CSF does is that in the case of my 3005s, it's unintentional. It just strikes me as a little odd to replicate (originally) unintentional construction flaws on purpose. (Side note: I consider this quite different from material flaws, like unevenness in loomstate denim, imperfections in leather grain, etc., which I fully embrace.) I'm actually not super obsessed with my jeans being perfectly constructed and I'm pretty generous, I think, in what I consider "good enough." Thinking about it, this might play into why I don't like one (or two) person brands as much as more traditional ones like Flat Head, Full Count, Warehouse, etc. The 1-2 person brands seem a bit too far from the "spirit" of jeans for me. While Roy, Ooe, etc. make awesome jeans, something about these strikes me as too special, and I tend to feel more "at home" in a more "mass produced" type of brand, I guess. CSF is a bit of an odd duck in that Konaka is a one-man brand that tries to create the impression of having been made in a WWII-era factory. I probably shouldn't complain since at least in my case I'm content with Japanese brands in the $200-250 range and don't expect them to get every little thing right. Although if every brand did the rolled back pocket edge of FH/Warehouse/a few others, that would be nice. Flash, your route into the hobby, as far as I can tell, sounds like it was through an initial interest in vintage - but I find it fascinating, really, that lots of fans of these very nitty-gritty repro details seem to have gotten there over time; so that the 501 fetish came after an existing interest in denim sparked by other, non-repro type brands like Nudie, Naked and Famous, etc. In my case, store-bought Levis were all I ever knew, so the discovery of high-quality European and Japanese brands blew my mind back in the day.

I originally was going to post this rant in regard to the current discussion in the Conners thread, but it felt off topic and like it better belonged here. I understand we're all maybe looking for something different from our jeans... but that being said, why does it matter if jeans are exactly like vintage Levis from a specific year? I see why you'd want that if you're paying CSF money for a pair of jeans that allegedly gets everything exactly accurate. But why, exactly, does that accuracy matter to you/us in the first place? I think that basically everything about a pair of TCB or Eternal, to name some cheaper Japanese brands, is superior to actual vintage Levis from the 40s or 50s, in terms of craftsmanship, materials, etc. It would be one thing if they represented an unparalleled high of manufacturing, but nobody would argue that the construction of vintage 501s beats Roy or Ooe. (And I do understand the pursuit of vintage 501 texture in fabrics - but can you really argue that Full Count, Warehouse, TCB, Ooe, and Denim Base haven't already achieved that?) I guess it just seems weird to me that seemingly microscopic details like correctly replicating a wonky stitch from a specific pair of jeans from October 1946 really matters that much or is worth paying double the cost of some Warehouse. Especially since nobody here actually seems to dress like they time traveled 74 years into the future. I like features like hidden rivets, rolled pocket edges, and that sort of thing because it shows the maker put a lot of thought and intentionality into designing the jeans. But intentionally replicating flaws that don't improve the aesthetics of the jean (which I point out as justification for why I do like details like textured denim and roping) is where this whole repro thing really loses me. (Side note, this is one reason I like Flat Head's approach, they're not really trying to reproduce a specific jean and just combine all the various aspects they like from vintage jeans as a whole.) The 501 fetish makes sense from a Japanese perspective back in the 80s when current Levis were clearly inferior to the 60s and earlier models, leading to demand for the better vintage jeans... but that's not the case anymore. We have so many great options now that it's just weird to me how we still uphold vintage 501s as the Holy Grail when there are so many great contemporary options - especially weird coming from most of us who were kids (or younger) in the 80s, aren't Japanese, and don't have some youthful nostalgia for deadstock 501s we could never afford to buy from BerBerJin back in 1990. These days I like jeans like the Warehouse 1001, 800, TCB 50s, Full Count 1108, Ooe, and so on, because they're a very high-quality rendition of a classic pair of jeans. I don't really care if the fit or minutiae are exactly accurate as long as they capture the spirit/"feel" of classic mid-century jeans, that's versatile and works for a bunch of different outfits/styles.

Although I appreciate vintage-style denim now, my favorites are probably still fabrics that are somewhere in the middle - ones that do something non-traditional, but aren't too extreme. Some examples are Flat Head's 14.5 oz, Eternal's 14.5 oz, PBJ's XX-005 and XX-011 fabrics, Samurai S0500xx, and Sugar Cane Okinawa. I do tend to prefer ones that are darker than vintage, I guess. I have no interest in super heavy fabrics or excessively wild ones. My Strike Gold jacket has the denim of the 5109/5104, it's easily the wildest fabric I own. I like it, but I wouldn't wear anything more extreme than that.

Those look good! That's about how much break I have in my Full Count 1108s - I think it's a good look.

It's interesting to me how almost everybody who's been in the raw denim game for a long time ends up preferring vintage-style fabrics rather than the more exaggerated ones. It took me a while, but even I lean in that direction now.