Taking Care of the World Tour

[Bobbo]

Finally me, my ass and a pair of 1920's TCB jeans are back in Gothenburg. I must say it was pretty fucking crazy wearing jeans in the Tokyo summerheat but a TCB-man does what a TCB-man has to, neh? We'll start with Kojima before a little backtracking to the week in Kyushu.
 

Let the tour begin!

We were staying in Osaka at the moment and took the Shinkansen down to Okayama where we switched to a regular JR-train. For those who want to see more of Japan I highly recommend getting the railpass, so easy getting around with and you have the Shinkansen taking you all the way south to Kagoshima.
 

Any way, it was quite clear already at the trainstation in Kojima that the city is very proud of their part of the denim community:

 

 

 

We were then picked up by the master himself whom drove us to the factory, about 10 minutes by car from the station. Neither me nor Inoue could contain our excitement so we jumped straight into the office/showroom and checked out the tour jeans and the original, haha. This was the first time I saw a pair of jeans older than 1960's, and man it's so awsome, if Inoue have managed to create a denim that well and like that - and I'm sure he has - we're in for a treat my friends! 



After a quick test to see if they fit, which they luckily did, Inoue introduced us to his lovely wife and gave us a tour of the factory while the crew were working. On the second floor they had the sewing studio, on the third they cut the fabric. On the side of the stairs Inoue had 5-6 broken machines, all of them over 100 years old. 

 

 

Inoue then went about showing us how each of the sewing machines worked, the different stitching used and so on. Very informative, cool to see and fun to hear about all the different machines and their purposes.

 

Cutting pocket fabric

 

 

The obligatory pic of TCBs vending machine

 

 

Funny enough one of my friends, whom I've barely introduced to the denim scene, couldn't resist trying on some gear and ending up with both a ranchman shirt and type II-jacket (can't blame him eh?). He also ended up as a model, Inoue and Minae joking about his resemblance with Ryan Gosling, haha.

 

 

More to come...

 

[Bobbo]

After that we went outside to shoot a few pictures of the jeans, 1920's in a 13 oz memphis denim.

 

 

 

 

We had a blast to say the least with lots of laughs, Inoue and Minae being great hosts and very easygoing. I hope to come back soon again and hang out some more, sadly we had to catch our train back to Osaka.

 

Back in Osaka we went to a really small bar that was just around the corner from where I stayed the last time I was in Japan 7 years ago. They had changed owners, and not much was the same but the new guys had put up this neat Lee-banner so I can't really complain to much.

 

 

[url=https://flic.kr/p/KTCbre]

 

Edit: 

Here are the measurements, BIG-style in centimeters:

 

Waist: 43

Front rise: 30

Back rise: 43,5

Thigh: 33

Inseam: 83

Hem: 22,5

Edited August 6, 2016 by Bobbo

[beautiful_FrEaK]

Must be the greatest start to any World Tour yet!

[Maynard Friedman]

Fantastic Bobbo, fantastic. Bravo!

[volvo240thebest]

starting in grand shtyle! wohoo!

[unders]

Fantastic update. If the tour ended now, I'd be a happy man.

[harls]

Awesome.

[oomslokop]

took care of business there bobbo! 

[Capsicum Fried Meat]

really enjoy the pics. Hope I could get a pair of 20s TCB jeans.

 

How's the new fabric Bobbo, any comments? 

[Bobbo]

Thank you gents.

 

^ The release is not superlong off mate. Soon you can get a pair.

The fabric is nice to the touch, bumpier than the 50's with quite a few neps, still having a lot of short hairiness despite the one wash-treatment. Colourwise it is just as royal blue like in the pictures, makes me think a bit of Denime's Kyoto special. Would have been interesting to see what the raw fabric looked like but sadly I was too revved up to ask.

 

It felt quite breathable in 30+ degrees too but I bet the loose cut helped out a lot. 

[Iron Horse]

Awesome start, looking forward to more updates, and getting my hands on the actual jeans.   

[louisbosco]

wow. that first post with pictures is truly amazing. what a great insight to the denim production. i've watched tcb on the side for about a year. might be the next on my list. great start mate!

[heavydoom]

great photos and i am super jealous that you got the royal tour of the TCB empire!!!!

 

what about the cats?????

[Bobbo]

Didn't see the cats.  

 

Let's rewind to the beginning of the trip. We landed pretty late in Tokyo so we only managed to get ourselves a decent bowl of ramen and crash in our capsule hostel.

 

 

 

The next day we made or way with the Shinkansen down to Hiroshima. 

 

 

 

I got hit by fever and sadly missed a lot of the town, did get my ass out of bed for the atomic bomb dome and the museum though. The red ball in the museum pic is how big the "fireball" was right after the explosion scaled after the citys size you see below. It's a crappy pic but you get somewhat of a grip of how big radius was destroyed by the bomb and the following fire raging through the city. It was an odd experience visiting the museum, pretty heavy stuff, people walking around sobbing.

 

 

 

To lighten things up we had scouted a craftbeer bar in Hiroshima called Raku Beer. We tried all 20-isch Japanese beers they had, a couple of them being really good. 

 

 

The next day we were off again, this time to Beppu, famous for its natural hot springs. They were everywhere.

 

 

I love Japanese signs.

 

[Bobbo]

In case you want to do something except bathing in hot springs in Beppu you can visit "The Hells" - 8 hot springs that are for viewing, sadly in a rather touristy fashion. 

 

 

 

In the evening we went to a yakiniku restaurant, and devoured plenty of food and drinks. Here I had my first encounter with Umeshu, plum wine, which was sweet and nice to switch things up with between the rounds of beers.

 

 

We only stayed in Beppu for one night, traveling on further south on Kyushu all the way down to Kagoshima with the active volcano Sakurajima watching over us from the other side of the bay. Sadly we didn't have time/funds to take the boat to Yakushima - an island south of Kagoshima which served as inspiration for the awsome Ghibli movie Princess Mononoke.

 

 

On the first day we went on a stroll to see an old bridge from the Edo period, had great tempura and sushi for dinner to celebrate one of the guys birthday.

 

 

 

The next day we took the boat over to Sakurajima. The weather turned from decent to awful pretty fast though and soon we couldn't see much at all. 

 

 

We did however have the best ramen on the entire trip in Kagoshima in a small place called Tontoro Ramen. 

 

 

Approved!

 

[redragon]

Great fit on the 20s there.

You are killing it as far as quality of update goes!

[nycsurfer530]

bobbo, curious; have you had any experience with warehouse jeans? I'm wondering if the 20s' fabric is comparable to the memphis cotton warehouse uses. 

[Bobbo]

^ Yeah, I have a few now, haha. Which Warehouse denim uses Memphis cotton? I know it is part of the banner denim but that is a mix of 3 different cottons. Did they use Memphis cotton for their 15th anniversary 1001XX denim? Or Duck Digger? Otherwise we're out of luck.

[nycsurfer530]

according to blue in green the 800, 700, 660, 1000, and 900 are all 100% Memphis cotton. The 800s have one of my favorite denims.

[Bobbo]

Ah, then that's the 1000XX denim. I've only handled it once at Caliroots but that was a long time ago.

[Bobbo]

Time to mix things up a little with some detail shots.

 

A different denim seems to be used for the beltloops just like on my Denime 1937's. Need to ask Inoue about it, didn't notice it until recently.

 

Scovill hardware

 

 

Guaranteed high quality suspender buttons

 

 

 

Red selvedge-ID

 

 

And a miserable attempt to capture the fabric

 

[Capsicum Fried Meat]

Nice detail shots Bobbo. Looking forward to the new fabric.

[Bobbo]

From Kagoshima we took the train back to the northern parts of Kyushu to enjoy Fukuoka. Close to where we lived there was a shrine.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Later that night we went out to eat at a Yatai (food stalls) that Fukuoka is known for. We went to Mami-chan's which I'd read good things about and they were just as kind as bloggers say. Of course weren't the only tourists who went to Mami-chans, of the ~10 people that could be served at the stall more than half were French.

 

 

 

You can also do your fair share of vintage shopping in Fukuoka. I don't remember the name of the area but I did stumble upon a Real McCoy's store. It was the first time I handled McCoys products and damn, one can't complain about the quality of the goods.

 

 

Later that night we stumbled upon a small bar in a basement called Bar Robin. It was a great night; the owner spoke good english and talked lots with us about the Japanese whisky industry, his life story and kept pouring us lots of free and very tasty whisky in between the best gin & tonics I've ever had. If you're ever in Fukuoka you should pay him a visit, it is close to Hakata station.

 

[Broark]

What a way to start out a world tour and the jeans look awesome!
I'd be in for the contest if they didn't have suspender buttons, just can't do it myself.

All the Japan travel photos are making me realize I need to go back ASAP.

[volvo240thebest]

no sweat Broark you can easily remove suspender buttons or even ask Hajime to not install them at all on your pair, if that's the only concern...

[Broark]

I think that might be the only concern I have with them, the fit looks awesome and I've been wanting a pair with a cinch back and exposed rivets for some time now.

[volvo240thebest]

well then it's excellent news... we need a Texas rep for the next TCB Olympics!

[Broark]

That way I can have a TCB tux with my 50's jacket!

Also curious, what's the weight of this new denim? I remember it being pretty light (~12 oz. or so) but I could be making that up.

[volvo240thebest]

13 oz Memphis cotton denim, should be perfect for the Texas heat!

[Broark]

Ideal! Looking forward to seeing how the world tour pair ages.