chicote

maybe he never sits down

SCENE: A quiet morning in San Francisco's Mission District. Slow zoom from sky on 21st and Valencia Street. Frame fix on Self Edge, a denim shop that has just opened for the morning. A small group of tech workers ride hoverboards across the frame from stage left, laughing amiably. Cut to interior of Self Edge. INT: Self Edge San Francisco. Neat rows of dark denim hang from hooks all around the shop. A polished wooden table, stationed in the back left of the room, holds a MacBook and a credit card reader. Behind this table, a heavy denim curtain leads to the back of the shop. Directly opposite the table, at stage right, is a small changing room and full-length mirror. A steep staircase at front stage right leads upwards to a small, open second floor. JASON enters from behind the curtain at back stage left and surveys the shop. He is alone, having just started his shift. For a moment, he stands in the center of the room, looking around proudly. Then he turns, walks behind the table, and slowly opens one of the table's wooden drawers. He withdraws a roll of measuring tape and shuts the drawer. JASON looks to the front of the shop again before walking back to the centre of the room, positioning himself in front of the dressing room mirror. He lifts one massive bicep and flexes in the mirror, then wraps the measuring tape around his bicep and flexes again, grinning to himself. JASON is in midst of repeating this on his other arm when the front door opens and YOUNG enters. JASON quickly hides the measuring tape and turns towards YOUNG, an innocent expression on his face. YOUNG (amiably): Morning, Jason! JASON (a bit surprised): Oh, uh, hey Young. ... A-aren't you supposed to be working in the afternoon? YOUNG (taking off jacket, casually crossing room to lean against staircase): Nah, I'm taking today off—we had band practice for six hours yesterday and I'm pretty wiped. JASON: Oh, I see. Well ... what's bringing you in so early? I haven't even fully opened the shop yet! Slightly nervous, JASON moves back behind the table and pulls a book of CDs from a different drawer. The book is titled "UNKNOWN BAY AREA HARDCORE VOL. XXI". He pulls a CD at random and inserts it into the MacBook. As he does this, YOUNG begins speaking. YOUNG: Well, I wanted to come in and give you some news—both good and bad. JASON (looking through CD book): Shit ... uh, start with the bad, I guess. YOUNG (sighing): I hate to have to tell you this, Jason, but ... you're cut from the modeling gig. JASON looks up, wide-eyed. He is clearly taken aback. JASON: W-what? YOUNG: Listen, I know that was your big dream ever since you started working here. It's just ... (trails off) JASON: It's just what? YOUNG (after a pause): It's just that some customers took issue with your body type. Like, a few big names. JASON (nervous): Like Pharrell? YOUNG: No, no ... listen, it doesn't matter who. All I know is that people didn't feel like you were accurately representing the fit of our clothes on our typical clientele. JASON: Well, that's 'cause our clientele is mostly— YOUNG: Yeah, I know ... (looks wistfully outside) ... scrawny people. JASON (spitefully): Ever since people started riding those hoverboards, it's like nobody cares about their muscles anymore. YOUNG: Well, most people don't seem to need them anymore. Unless it's to hail an Uber or lift a bottle of Soylent to their lips, most people seem perfectly able to get by never raising their arms above keyboard-level. JASON and YOUNG are silent for a moment, both gazing out the window. A self-driving Tesla silently passes by the front window of the shop. JASON: You know, you're right. It's not fair to our customer base that I'm the one modeling their clothes. (short pause) Well, thanks for breaking it to me, Young. YOUNG: No problem. You wanna hear the good news? JASON: Sure! YOUNG: Well, it's the same as the bad news ... You're cut! JASON (confused): What do you mean? YOUNG: I saw you measuring your bicep earlier ... Dude! Twenty-one centimeters? JASON (sheepishly): Yeah ... YOUNG: Congratulations! That's huge! JASON: (sheepishly, smiling): Yeah ... YOUNG crosses the room to where JASON is standing. They high-five and embrace warmly, then JASON lifts his bicep again for YOUNG to take a closer look. YOUNG: Wow, twenty-one centimeters ... that's the same as the leg opening on my 47s... JASON: Yeah, I'm pretty proud about it! YOUNG (walking back to stairwell, picking up his jacket): It's amazing. Anyway, I'll catch you later, bro. JASON: Yeah, see you at your show! YOUNG exits through the front doors and turns left down the street. He narrowly misses being hit by someone flying up the sidewalk on a hoverboard, going the opposite direction. JASON sighs and smiles, returning to the table at back stage left. He looks momentarily at the MacBook. Cut to over Jason's shoulder, where the Self Edge website is visible. An image of JASON stands proudly on the screen, modelling an olive green Lady White t-shirt. JASON lingers on this image for a moment, then closes the laptop and cranks up the hardcore CD on the store's speakers. He returns leisurely to the stool behind the table and folds his arms behind his head, leaning back against the wall. JASON (to himself): Oh well, guess that was fun while it lasted. SCENE CLOSE

i hope an extra donation will get a photo of your penis compared to the pocket opening of your 50s?

^agreed, most every domestic sewing machine will do a zigzag stitch and that will be enough to hold off further wear until such time as you need to send the jeans in for more extensive repairs. it will be way more cost-effective in the long run, absolutely!

Lol more or less copying your second outfit^ welcome skateboards / lady white / tender x3 / lofgren (can you tell I've washed them???)

You can prevent that from growing for a while with a simple repair you can do at home. Get some (ideally poly-core cotton, but doesn't really matter) thread, which you can find at any drug store, dollar store, craft store, etc, and use a whip stitch to sew the front and back halves of the crotch seam together. Here's a quick diagram that maybe will help: The premise is: cut about a foot of thread, thread a needle with one end and tie a knot at the other end. Start from the inside of the jeans and wrap the thread around the tearing seam as shown in the left side of the diagram. You will end up with something sort of like the right side at the end -- don't worry if it doesn't look exactly right. Then sew back through to the inside of the jeans, tie a knot and cut the excess thread, and you're good for at least another few months of wear!

ah yeah that was a difficult cut for me. only jeans i have ever grown out of. the denim is excellent though, one of my favourites! give em a few months and the green caste will really come alive.

those stevensons look great! what model are they?

I'm wary of us getting into a guessing game about x brand being rumoured to do x thing in their production process. If exploitative labour practices exist in the Japanese denim industry (and how surprising is this, considering the prevalence of labour abuses in the fashion industry as a whole?), this issue affects the entire industry, not just certain brands within it. Clearly judgments based on country of production are fallible—ie. made-in-China products can be made ethically, just as made-in-USA or -Japan products can be made unethically, to add to Iron Horse's point that country-of-production labels only have to represent a fraction of the total production process. Similarly, advocating for policy-based solutions, certifications, etc. seems ineffective, given how easy it seems to be for companies to flout any ethics rules that governments might attempt to enforce. Ironically, then, a market-driven problem might best be solved by a market-based solution. As ethically-minded consumers, I argue the best response is to demand fair working conditions for the products we buy, clearly and unequivocally, across the entire industry. If brands share our concern (or at least recognize the seriousness of our demand and still desire our business), it is in their best interest to be transparent about how, and by whom, their products are made. We are consumers in a relatively small niche of the fashion world, and so have a better opportunity than most to make ourselves heard. If this is something that is truly concerning (and not just momentarily surprising), I suspect that the brands we care about here will feel obligated to make an effort to convince us that they are deserving of our business.

^my thoughts exactly! a blue chambray is really the only thing i feel any inclination to buy right now, and if i was only to have 1 more shirt it would have to be from roy. on another note—i'm sure this has been posted here before (probably multiple times) and people have already seen it (probably multiple times) but i revisited this video this morning and forgot how gripping of a cinematic experience it is...

@MasonAlexander thanks! i won't be in squamish much till end of august, but ill be living there again afterwards--you're always welcome to come through! @Hendsch lol that's a tough thing to have stick with you... at least in LA I imagine you aren't forced to pull out the tux 8 months of the year like in portland!

small update on my 50s jacket ... mostly used to layer this year as most of my jeans are still dark and i am self-conscious of my canadian tux becoming too austere. it's also the graveyard of unfinished embroidery -- every single thing i've started on it i have abandoned hahah. anyway, moderate amount of wear over the last 2.5 years, washed pretty often. sorry they are a bit blurry, wanted to keep iso down so had to go real low on everything else. thanks for looking!

looking into ricketts indigo, mentioned in roy's instagram post... a team of two fabric artists, Rowland and Chinami Ricketts, who specialize in indigo farming / dyeing and kasuri/ikat weaving, respectively. i'm curious what their involvement is—whether Roy is just using japanese indigo from their farm or whether there was a more substantial collaboration in terms of fabric design... interested in more details. also the buttons on that shirt look great.

Wow, glad to hear you ended up okay. I have done many extensive pocket replacements and seat darning jobs in the past and would be happy to repair your pants with my leftover 15oz sda denim for cost of shipping. would like for you to be able to keep wearing those as they look really great and I'm sure hold a lot of value for you personally. pm me if youre interested!

wow, great fit and nice review! that fabric looks really interesting too.