FashBlog.com

Written by James Fohl

In the past day, how many people have you seen wearing blue jeans? If you are anything like me then the answer to that question is a lot; mostly because it would be impossible to count every individual you ran into wearing blue jeans.

Take a look in your closet at home and see how many pairs of blue jeans you own. If you are like the majority of America, then you probably own more pairs of blue jeans than any other kind of pants, unless of course you hate blue jeans.

For some reason or another, blue jeans appear to be the most comfortable pants solution for most people.
With this said, how many people exactly know how blue jeans came about? Many people overlook the important fact of how blue jeans were invented, but fail to see that if blue jeans were never invented then we would have a different set of clothing in our closets.

Although many people believe that blue jeans were invented back during the gold rush, this is not exactly true. Instead, jeans were first invented in Genoa, Italy because the navy of this independent republic required an article of clothing that sailors could wear either wet or dry, and that could easily be rolled up. Because they were worn on ships, the sea water would have a habit of turning the jeans white via methods of bleaching.

Because jeans came from a place called Genoa, Italy, you have to wonder where exactly did the denim come from that made these jeans, after all aren't popular jeans made out of durable denim? Denim came from a place in France called Nimes, and that is where today we get the name "denim" for the material that the jeans made in Genoa, Italy are made from.

Now that you are aware that blue jeans were not invented in the United States, let me tell you how they became a part of the American culture. This does trace its roots back to the gold rush, around the year of 1872, when a Bavarian dry goods merchant named Levi Strauss living in San Francisco joined forces with a guy named Jacob Davis to create pants that would eventually evolve into today's blue jeans. Although it was Jacob Davis idea, he did not have the money to purchase a patent, so Levi purchased the patent, and thus became the glorious blue jeans man of America.

For almost a hundred years (okay more like eighty years) Levi blue jeans were geared towards workers. This pretty much changed back in the 1950's, when teenagers and some young adults began wearing the blue jeans as a protest against conformity.

This outburst caused a lot of chaos during the fifties, but by the sixties and early seventies wearing blue jeans was considered normal, as they had become a part of general informal fashion in the United States. Today, as I mentioned earlier, blue jeans can be found on individuals everywhere, and almost in everyone's closet.