If you’ve had your denim for years, join the club. San Francisco pro linebacker Fred Warner is even a member of the squad. To prove it, Warner recently visited his local Levi’s® Tailor Shop in this Tricks of the Tailor clip to show that denim is made to last a lifetime… rips and holes included.
In fact, wear and tear only adds character to Warner’s clothes. And Levi’s® knows it. With sustainability as a core value, the brand encourages customers to stop contributing to textile waste, instead urging people to visit their own Levi’s® Tailor Shop to customize, repair, and bring new life to their denim garments. Alongside these solutions—which are part of Levi’s® Buy Better, Wear Longer initiative—the brand has also invested in more sustainable production practices. Its water finishing processes and water recycling procedures have helped the brand save over 4 billion liters of water and resulted in the recycling of close to 10 billion liters of water since they were introduced.
Ready to do your part to help save the planet with your pair of jeans? Well, select Levi’s® Tailor Shops worldwide are prepared to assist you. As Warner’s Tricks of the Tailor video shows, darning and distressing are a few techniques Levi’s® master tailors might use to extend the life of your denim. But they have many more. So keep scrolling to get a peek at the tailors’ complete playbook, which just received star athlete’s stamp of approval.
Do the Darn Thing
If you learn anything from Levi’s® and Warner in this guide, it’s that almost all apparel can be salvaged. The football player didn’t just give up on his jeans because of some random rips. Instead, he brought his favorite pants in to the denim brand’s Tailor Shop because damage like that is what darning’s for. If you don’t already know, darning is a sewing technique, often done by hand, that repairs damages not along a seam. With some darning repairs, possible in less than 20 minutes, you won’t regret bringing in your old denim to resurrect it for another lifetime of wear.
Pick a Patch
Patches are old denim’s best friend. Not only can they cover holes, they’re also decorations that personalize your denim so it will always stand out. In the Tricks of the Tailor video, Warner opted for a custom eight ball patch on the breast pocket of his vintage trucker jacket. So, follow his lead by heading to a Levi’s® store to patch things up and reimagine your denim for the future.
It’s Tailor-Made
True to its name, tailoring is the bread and butter of every Levi’s® Tailor Shop. For a perfect fit, you can bring your jeans and other garments by for waist adjustments, inseam tapering, and hemming. Gone are the days of standard fits, it’s time for you to come up with something entirely your own that you’ll never want to take off.
Distress Signal
It’s no secret that all things vintage are a vibe. You want your clothing to have character and not appear so generic, but that takes time. To speed up the process, Warner teamed up with Levi’s® master tailor Marco Ruiz, who hand distressed his jacket to give it some texture via authentic looking wear and tear. And you can do the same with your pieces at a Levi’s® Tailor Shop. Distressing only takes an hour, but adds decades of character to your denim.
Check out the Levi’s® Tailor Shop to learn more and find a tailor shop near you.
Produced by Mia Jamilano, Photography by Ulysses Ortega, Art Direction by Ariel Weaver, and Design by Jonathan “JP” Chavez.