Skull Jeans by An Alchemist

[jasutek]

eliminate your stacks altogether

[sense.]

...and many thanks to all the folks posting evo pics in fit info in here. it's what made me want to get them.

agreed. the evo pics of these jeans also triggered my purchase of the 5010xx. thanks to all those that have, and will continuously contribute to this thread..

[steven_s]

yeah i've had my skulls for maybe a month and a half now, and the stacking won't settle. everything else is well in place though. it may be because i have to climb into them, stomping out the stacks (i'm 5'6" and kept the full inseam lol)

[Alleyne]

6 months, worn everyday

Marshal, I just noticed something on your jeans thats just like my imperial dukes. On the right thigh theres a lone one that points down, but on the left thigh there isnt any at all. I think its our way of sitting or stand lol.

[grand_theft_auto]

Do not buy the one-wash version.. they destroy the denim in the washing/drying process.

Just came across this - i got a pair of one wash 5507 6x6 in the one-wash and they're real nice. The denim isn't remotely destroyed... anyone know what this is about?

[grand_theft_auto]

maybe it's a sort of 'delayed-reaction' destruction where i'll be walking down the street one day and the jeans will just disintegrate around me and end up as a pile of ash on the side-walk......

[moykky]

maybe it's a sort of 'delayed-reaction' destruction where i'll be walking down the street one day and the jeans will just disintegrate around me and end up as a pile of ash on the side-walk......

It's possible! I saw it in some movie where they changed the polarization of the raygun used by those tripods in that end-of-the-world movie with Tom Cruise. Must be some scientologist shit? It would affect your other clothing as well...

[grand_theft_auto]

It's possible! I saw it in some movie where they changed the polarization of the raygun used by those tripods in that end-of-the-world movie with Tom Cruise. Must be some scientologist shit? It would affect your other clothing as well...

sheeeit!! who would have thought the simple application of water and heat to the denim could have such catastrophic consequences! we must alert Big/Kiosk 78 etc. to the true nature of these heinous "one-wash" products. i will be demanding a refund immediately LOL!

[Jackboot]

Do not buy the one-wash version.. they destroy the denim in the washing/drying process.

Just came across this - i got a pair of one wash 5507 6x6 in the one-wash and they're real nice. The denim isn't remotely destroyed... anyone know what this is about?

one-wash = not raw

no-wash = raw

The industrial washing/drying process artificially "wears" the denim and indigo is removed. You receive the jeans in an artificially worn state and they will not age with your body the same as raw. I have not seen a pair of one-wash jeans with high-contrast whiskers etc.

Any pair of jeans that you can go and buy at Sears has been through an industrial washing process. I personally think that buying one-wash denim totally defeats the purpose of buying jeans that you are going to wash sparingly. You may as well buy a pair of $30 Levis in terms of how they are going to fade.

[klue]

one-wash = not raw

no-wash = raw

The industrial washing/drying process artificially "wears" the denim and indigo is removed. You receive the jeans in an artificially worn state and they will not age with your body the same as raw. I have not seen a pair of one-wash jeans with high-contrast whiskers etc.

Any pair of jeans that you can go and buy at Sears has been through an industrial washing process. I personally think that buying one-wash denim totally defeats the purpose of buying jeans that you are going to wash sparingly. You may as well buy a pair of $30 Levis in terms of how they are going to fade.

you can wash the jeans weekly and still get high contrast fading. it is how hard you wear them. one wash is actually better for high contrast fades because there will be less shifting, and therefore more definition.

[klue]

i dyed my skulls with yellow rit dye the other night

[grand_theft_auto]

one-wash = not raw

no-wash = raw

The industrial washing/drying process artificially "wears" the denim and indigo is removed. You receive the jeans in an artificially worn state and they will not age with your body the same as raw. I have not seen a pair of one-wash jeans with high-contrast whiskers etc.

Any pair of jeans that you can go and buy at Sears has been through an industrial washing process. I personally think that buying one-wash denim totally defeats the purpose of buying jeans that you are going to wash sparingly. You may as well buy a pair of $30 Levis in terms of how they are going to fade.

fair points, but the 5507 6x6 i got have the usual intense indigo color and no signs of fading as a result of the factory wash. they look like a pair of sanforized raw sda's i had after i gave them a wash - like raw denim that's had a first soak, that's it!

i'd have taken raw 5507s if they'd been available but they weren't. i would have given them a soak anyway just cos they lose a little length on the leg and i wanted them hemmed. in my opinion people shouldn't be put off the one-wash because all they have had done to them is what you'll do to them at some point anyway. i guess you don't get the satisfaction of them being "all your own work" but who cares? a few months down the line with no furher washing, no one will be able to tell if you bought them washed or raw.

i think the idea that the factory wash destroys or in some way compromises the integrity of the fabric is a bit ridiculous frankly...

[jjkchung]

i dyed my skulls with yellow rit dye the other night

good job on the dye, and nice patch work.

[Jackboot]

you can wash the jeans weekly and still get high contrast fading. it is how hard you wear them. one wash is actually better for high contrast fades because there will be less shifting, and therefore more definition.

I don't mean to come off as argumentative, but I think this is incorrect. I may not know what I'm talking about so much, but as one of the handful of retailers for Skull in the USA, kiya sure does, and I agree with him that an industrial wash destroys raw denim in the sense that it does not retain its "vintage" quality of contrast fading. I think this is what kiya meant and not that the denim itself is weakend in any way.

It's true that contrast fading is the result of being worn hard, but there's only so much contrasting that can occur when a good portion of the indigo has been stripped from the denim by an initial industrial wash. By definition, contrast is the difference between the intensities of colours. If you start with less indigo (less intensity), how are you going to get more contrast? It's simply not possible.

You are claiming that one-wash will get better contrast fading because there will be less "shifting", by which I think you mean "bleeding", and this is just not how natural indigo and raw denim works. More repeated yarn dips into vats of indigo = more saturation of the yarn = more indigo that can stay bonded to the cotton in areas where it is not abraded which contrasts with areas where the cotton has been returned to its white/yellow colour due to the indigo being worn off (whiskers, honeycombs, etc). Natural indigo does not "shift" or "bleed" from one area to the next. It either stays bonded to the cotton or it wears off.

BTW, I'd +rep on your dye job, but the rep function is broken for me (IE8 + sufu = coding hell). Looks very cool. Do you have before pictures to compare with?

[erbs]

I have not seen a pair of one-wash jeans with high-contrast whiskers etc.

The three 'grail' pairs that this forum used to go nuts for all started out one-wash: Tony's Sorahikos, Ryu's Canes, and the denim gallery 811s.

With this being said, I would personally choose raw over one-wash any day because I do think the creases turn out sharper. also, there's a certain aesthetic value attached to soaking a pair of raw jeans that I wouldn't want to give up.

[Jackboot]

The three 'grail' pairs that this forum used to go nuts for all started out one-wash: Tony's Sorahikos, Ryu's Canes, and the denim gallery 811s.

Sorry, I was referring only to skulls' one-wash. I'm not familiar with any other brand's one-wash denims, but every pair of one-wash skulls I see pictures of is kind of disappointing.

[pepperdanky]

I think the "shifting" he was referring to was the actual shrinking of the jeans. If you get raw, even with sanforized denim, the creases will shift after the first wash.

Kiya literally meant that the one-wash process that skull uses destroys the jeans. The people that have had problems with threads breaking/seams ripping prematurely all bought the one-wash model.

[klue]

i had missed the skull specific wash part. i trust kiya, i got my skulls raw, and soaked them myself....but i still think people are far to nervous about getting their jeans wet. i dont know how many greezy blown out crotches and flat, streached out seams i have seen in this forum. the jeans need to get wet to stay healthy

[haptronic]

whoa this thread has blown up...

as far as the one wash versus raw argument goes...

the raw version of skulls is the only version that kiya has sold to the best of my knowledge, and in fact that is the only way he sells these jeans.[please correct me if this is wrong]

skull themselves sell them in a one wash state and always have, i honestly cannot see a company that is into vintage style jeans that fade well to do themselves such a disservice as to weaken the jeans with an industrial wash, to the best of my knowledge the jeans are basically soaked, perhaps on a larger scale than you would at home but basically the same thing.

there is conversely an inherent problem with raw jeans [if left unsoaked before wear], the denim is full of sizing [starch] to facilitate the sewing process, this creates unusually sharp creases which create points of friction that can lead to small holes and further on to full blown tears.

this is the cause of most crotch blow outs in nudies and imperials, in fact imperial had a warning on the old website [it may still be on there] warning of this very thing.

skulls have plenty enough indigo to handle a wash at the factory.

[moykky]

^^ Hear, hear haptronic!

One wash here or there don't mean nothing regarding the fading (except in my experience, unstarched denim fades faster). Long periods (or hard wear) beetween washes produces contrast fading.

And I think that with "shifting" Klue meant shifting of creases and such (due shrinking)? I always remember my first encounter with raw denim (not that I knew such existed)...

[grand_theft_auto]

whoa this thread has blown up...

as far as the one wash versus raw argument goes...

the raw version of skulls is the only version that kiya has sold to the best of my knowledge, and in fact that is the only way he sells these jeans.[please correct me if this is wrong]

skull themselves sell them in a one wash state and always have, i honestly cannot see a company that is into vintage style jeans that fade well to do themselves such a disservice as to weaken the jeans with an industrial wash, to the best of my knowledge the jeans are basically soaked, perhaps on a larger scale than you would at home but basically the same thing.

there is conversely an inherent problem with raw jeans [if left unsoaked before wear], the denim is full of sizing [starch] to facilitate the sewing process, this creates unusually sharp creases which create points of friction that can lead to small holes and further on to full blown tears.

this is the cause of most crotch blow outs in nudies and imperials, in fact imperial had a warning on the old website [it may still be on there] warning of this very thing.

skulls have plenty enough indigo to handle a wash at the factory.

sage words haptronic! your opinion seems by far the most plausible. i mean really, what would fabfour be doing to them in the washing process that would weaken the stitching fer christ-sakes? that'd have to be a pretty brutal wash and there would be evidence of wear on the fabric as a result. there isn't, so it is clearly, as you say, just like soaking at home but on a bigger scale.....

[lenn]

i got my 5109xx in a one wash state, and i've got 5 months of wear in them right now. i have no problems with stitching (not more than normal, that is) or things breaking down anywhere. i'm even getting more of a vintage-y fade than most of the 5010's i see on here, whilst it's the same denim used.

i pretty much cannot believe the anal chemists are destroying their jeans on purpose with just a wash... i doubt they would still be alive in japan if they did.

[grand_theft_auto]

based on many of the fit pics in this thread, i'd say that the stitching blowing out is probably more as a result of buying 10 sizes too small than any deficiencies in the manufacture or washing process

[moykky]

based on many of the fit pics in this thread, i'd say that the stitching blowing out is probably more as a result of buying 10 sizes too small than any deficiencies in the manufacture or washing process

10 sizes too small just looks better!

[grand_theft_auto]

right, whatever you say homie..... aren't these from the vice magazine "don't" gallery?

[altwaev]

Anyway! I'm eagerly awaiting the collab between Self Edge and Skull

where can i find more info on this? sounds like it will be awesome!

[mydenvermax]

Went to Palm Beach for the weekend, and I decided that my jeans could use a soak. Their first one, at ~100 days. The waist is nice and snug again, and the denim is crispy. I think the humidity where I live in Houston makes the denim stretch and become limp pretty quickly. Now they're stacking well again, they fit better, and the contrasts are more defined.

[chambo2008]

skulls 5010 6x6 prob worn for 3months 1 soak crappy blackberry pic's

[PandaDenim]

where can i find more info on this? sounds like it will be awesome!

I dunno, Kiya will update us as the collab progresses I assume.

[PandaDenim]

one wash 7x6 version, 1.5 years of wear

1 soak/1machine wash

Do you think i will need to repair any of these eventually?

If you have worn those for 1.5 years already I think they look good for at least another 1.5 years.

But if you have the extra material lying around you might as well do it.