The history of denim and how jeans were created
Jodie Foster, Billie Perkins and Robert De Niro perform a scene in Martin Scorsese’s Taxi Driver in New York City, New York, in 1976.
Michael Ochs Archives | Movie Pix | Getty Images
In the waning days of the gold rush in California, a local miner’s wife faced a problem.
Because her husband’s denim work pants kept ripping, her tailor, Jacob Davis, came up with the idea of adding copper rivets at key stress points like pocket corners and the base of the button to keep them from ripping.
Davis’s “riveted trousers” quickly became a huge success and, unbeknownst to him at the time, marked the official birth of the blue jean, a garment that would transform fashion and represent the United States worldwide.
“It’s really democratized American fashion, and it’s also become the largest export we’ve ever sent to the world, because people specifically identify jeans with American Western culture,” said Shawn Grain Carter, a fashion professor at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York. “It doesn’t matter your economic or social class. It doesn’t matter what your views are in terms of the political spectrum. Everyone wears denim.”
Jacob Davis
Courtesy: Levi Strauss & Co.
Denim is a major sales driver for retailers large and small these days, as the global denim market reached $101 billion this year, up 28% from 2020, according to data from market research firm Euromonitor International. Major garment companies American Eagle with Levi Strauss They are racing to capture that market, leaning on A-list celebrities like Sydney Sweeney and Beyonce to win over shoppers and boost sales in a volatile economy.
But if it weren’t for Levi Strauss, founder of the eponymous blue jeans company, Davis’s invention might not have made it far beyond the railroad town where it was created in the early 1870s.
How did Levi’s create blue jeans?
Tracey Panek, Levi’s in-house historian, said that soon after Davis created his riveted trousers, then called “waistsuits” or “overalls,” they began selling like “hot cakes” and he needed a business partner to get a patent. So he wrote a letter to Strauss, a Bavarian-born immigrant who ran a successful wholesale business in San Francisco and provided Davis with the denim he used to create his riveted trousers.
“The secret of the Pents,” Davis wrote in a letter to Strauss, “is the Rivits I have put in those Pockets, and I have found the demand so great that I cannot make up for them quickly enough.” According to PBS.
Levi Strauss
Courtesy: Levi Strauss & Co.
Strauss, an “astute” businessman, recognized the opportunity and agreed to partner with Davis, Panek said.
“This would be the first time Levi produced its own products,” Panek said. “He was no longer just importing and selling other people’s goods. He was producing and selling himself to retailers.”
On May 20, 1873, the two men received a patent for riveted trousers and eventually opened a factory on Fremont Street, near today’s Salesforce tower in San Francisco’s financial district.
They promised workers they would provide the most durable jeans on the market, and soon business boomed.
Dude farm dudes and American workers
Thanks to Strauss’ wholesale connections, the company’s riveted coveralls soon spread throughout the United States, becoming the choice of working men everywhere: miners, cowboys, farmers; Any position requiring durable clothing.
At the time, jeans were reserved solely for business environments, but as emerging denim manufacturers competed for a similar customer base, they sought to expand their product lines to increase sales.
“Slowly and steadily as we got into the 20th century you start to see some of these manufacturers making variations,” said New York-based fashion historian Sonya Abrego. “There was a design called spring bottoms, which were more form-fitting, more dressed-up, a little wider, maybe the kind the factory foreman would wear, right? Just unlike the guy in the shop.”
In 1934, Levi created the first line of jeans for women. At that time, denim was becoming more popular in non-work environments, particularly for activities such as farm holidays, camping and horseback riding.
“So they were kind of wearing cowboy attire or worker attire, but they were wearing it in a vacation setting,” Abrego said.
Courtesy: Levi Strauss & Co.
Dude ranch holidays had become popular because there were finally highways connecting different parts of the country, and few people were willing to travel to Europe during the war. According to archival postings from the time, companies like Levi began running ads highlighting their jeans as “dude ranch” and “authentic western riding wear” to capture customers looking for jeans to bring with them on vacation.
These cultural moments helped denim spread beyond workers, but jeans didn’t take off until World War II, when American fashion in general began to change. It did not become common everyday wear until after World War II.
The rise of the backyard barbecue
By the time World War II ended, the powerful American consumer had begun to emerge. For years, Americans had been forced to ration common goods such as rubber, sugar, and meat, while also being encouraged to save money by purchasing war bonds and hoarding spare cash.
As the country transitioned from wartime to peacetime, Americans were ready to splurge and soon began spending heavily on new cars, gadgets, and clothing.
“With a little bit more money to spend, you start to see a bigger push for leisure wear, fun clothes, play clothes, clothes to wear to a backyard barbecue,” Abrego said. “Clothes that we would consider casual style today.”
Courtesy: Levi Strauss & Co.
Slowly and surely, it has become increasingly acceptable for both men and women to wear jeans outside of work environments. Denim manufacturers then pushed to allow jeans in schools.
“They wanted to sell to as many people as possible,” Abrego said. “The idea that jeans are good for school means they’re good for every day, too.”
By the 1960s, denim manufacturers had expanded their offerings and were selling a wide variety of colors, fits, and styles. It became a symbol of the hippie movement and a mainstay on Hollywood sets.
Soon denim was everywhere, and the 1970s brought the iconic bell bottom trousers and the first version of the “designer jean” produced by labels and brands like Calvin Klein and Gloria Vanderbilt whose designs had nothing to do with workwear or western wear.
Since then, denim has remained a constant in global fashion. Although silhouettes, washes and cuts change over time, jeans never go out of style, which is what makes them so durable, Abrego said.
“This is a design from 1873… Do we see anything else on the street from 1873? It’s kind of crazy if you think about it that way,” Abrego said. “We can talk about all the details, all the changes in production, and all the different fits and finishes, but it’s something that’s recognizable, it’s still a pair of jeans. For me as a historian, that continuity is so intriguing because I can’t really name anything else that has stayed the same to this degree.”
