Denim Country
Denim Country
The wild west was loud.
Horses and dust and long light. Country so big you could ride all day and watch the same mountain the whole time.
And the cloth that went through every bit of it was blue.
Why blue
Indigo cotton was hard wearing and it did not quit. It took sun. It took dust. It took rain and it went again the next morning.
It went dark with dirt and it went pale where a rider moved the most, and nobody minded either one. That was the appeal. The cloth kept a record of the ride.
The jacket
A jean jacket is short for a reason. It clears a saddle.
The arms have to swing. The cuffs have to close at the wrist so nothing catches. The collar has to come up when the weather turns, and it always turns.
That shape got settled out there a long time ago and it got settled right. I have not touched it and I do not want to.
The jeans
The Cowboy Jeans are cut cowboy, with a forty inch inseam, so there is real length to work with over a boot.
The front pocket is designed to take a large cowboy buckle. The back pockets are our teardrop shape and the coin pocket is cut in that same shape.
Those are small decisions. They come straight from the people I ride with.
The people
I have ridden those roads more times than I can count, some of them on a 1948 Panhead.
I have ridden with cowboys. Real ones. Ranchers with hands carved by weather and work, friends of mine, men who still look the West in the eye.
None of that is history to me. It is a phone call.
Half a world away
The finest denim on earth is woven in Okayama, Japan.
That is where the looms are. That is where the people are who have given their lives to this one thing. So we went, with patterns in hand, and stayed at it for years.
The denim is fourteen ounce selvedge, rope dyed, with a very high warp density, and it is made for us there. The cuffs are ours. The stitching runs triple-needle throughout, in bright gold thread you can see across a room. There is a diamond back stitch on the collar and our donut button at the throat. The Quality Outdoor Clothing label is sewn inside.
Why it matters
There is big country on one side of this and a room in Okayama on the other, where one family has been at the work for generations.
The jacket and the jeans hold both at once. That is the part I like.
Your turn
Where has yours been? Hit reply and tell me. I answer these myself.
Have a nice day. I mean that.
- Josh
SHOP THE STORY
the Black Bear Brand ONE Jean Jacket (gen-2)
the Sun Washed ONE Jean Jacket (gen-2)
RELATED READING
The New ONE Jean Jacket from Black Bear Brand