What cut jeans should I wear if I'm not ridiculously skinny?

levi's 501s

If you feel like your flared jeans are looking a bit late-90s lately, you might want to think about not wearing jeans: plenty of nice trousers look good and Now when worn a bit flared or a bit loose.

I don't understand...if you can't see the tops of your feet, how does anyone notice yr shoes?

they feel them when you use them to kick their asses

501s

Umm you people are seriously recommending 501s to someone whose problem is with jeans being too tight? They're one of the 90% of Levis cuts made for the Planet of the Ass-Drought

no 2 flares unless you are dane cook then no 2 u

^^^^ nabisco yes

Get a "relaxed fit" tapered leg jean, like they sell at most places that aren't trying to appeal to youth. Or wear pants. Jeans are kind of out atm anyway.

alzo ----

DKNY Jeans 'Brooklyn' Cut are v. nice and forgiving for a little butt heaviness.

my pair of 501s is straight-legged but still comfy and bigger than the 514s (and im not that small a dude). if grozart is worried abt size he could get the 501xx a couple inches too big and then sit in a bath with them!

i finally got jeans that fit the way i want. they are nautica and they have a super elastic-y waistband, just in time for thanksgiving

more like slightly elastic-y but good enough

http://qualitywholesalestore.com/images/Elastic%20Waist%20Jeans.jpg

elastic waistband? i'm afraid of that idea...

I THINK LEE DISCONTINUED MY FAVORITE JEANS. Fucking fucks. About 2/3 of t their offerings now are BOOT-CUT. Euurgh.

in 6th grade my mom bought me a pair of jeans with patches of alternating blue-white stripe seersucker. for two weeks i was known as 'conductor choo choo' and i still do not know why.

(i wish i had them, they were pretty awesome)

i'm a fan of H&M jeans but i'm pretty skinny

RIP cowgirl dungarees ;_;

sit in a bath with them!
have you done this,max?

jeans feel gross when wet on body

no but ive shrunk jeans by putting them in a bath and then putting them on. i wouldnt do it right now but in the middle of the day in summer its awesome. plus you turn your legs blue.

Jeans are kind of out atm anyway.

rong!
it is just that pants have become more in, creating an eclipse effect but not actually an eclipse

uninspiring, not to mention a little biased towards the skinny look. As for casual trousers, it looks like cargo pants are all Topman can be arsed with. - http://www.topman.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/CategoryDisplay?catalogId=17551&storeId=12555&categoryId=38989&parent_category_rn=38987&langId=-1&top=Y. Seriously, skinny jeans are wack unless you look like an 18-year old Bobby Gillespie. It's not that I couldn't wear them (I'm not exactly captain lardy, but no it would look retarded) I just think they look stupid on 80% of the population. Might stick to the flares and baggies. They may not be very cutting edge, but they suit me okay.

Still interested in alternatives though. What sort of non-jean trousers are cool these tags?

I emailed Lee begging them to explain/bring back the cowgirl. Will report back.

i have been coveting james brand jeans but have only seen them online not in real life but they look good

that would be rad
xpost

the range between too baggy and too tight on me is so, so, so tiny

they really should bring it back - you should use jw's photos of brooklyn kids wearing cowboy shirts as part of your argument. i want cowboy boots suddenly but i think i should just buy some frye boots

xpost obv

They're a tapered leg, ankle opening small enough to just barely get a rugged boot under it but not "skinny" like the ruched hipster ankles. Waist not a huge amount smaller than hips, so it doesn't cut you in half when you sit, not "low" rise so back doesn't pull down too far. Very tight in thigh and ass. NO STRETCH at all.

Please please please buy Frye boots and I will live vicariously through u.

grozart, try the jeans at M&S.

buy some JNCO stock, child of the 90s

I want to try max's technique with my gigantic gangster carhartts

like, make the water as hot as possible, right?

ha, why do you think that will do anything to gigantic carhartts

it seems like a worthy experiment

501s

Women's Levis what is WRONG with these people?? Copy actually says "cut to minimize curves". OH REALLY? WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO WITH THEM, THEN?

holy geez the frye boots i like are so expensive, though they wld last forever and play into my post-apocalyptic fascination. need music things more tho. and tight black jeans.

i like the levis 503s (wearing a pair right now).

505s

tom i dont think thats going to do anything to your carhartts unless the denim is unwashed. but if you just want to sit in the bath your pants on, thats fine too.

i keep reading this as jeans to wear if i *am* ridiculously skinny, so, whoops. i guess just yeah don't wear anything too baggy. pos something with a bit of the new fangled stretch fabrics in them - they are magical + comfortable

I've done "tell us what fit you like and we'll show you the perfect jeans!" tests on two websites and they want me to wear either flares or Lucky brand, which start at $100. Oh how I weep.

Men should only wear 501's.

no

grozart if you want some jeans that actually fit you (not skin-tight--just not baggy or cut in a way that doesn't feel right on your body), get the 501XXs (the shrink-to-fits), turn them inside out, stick em in a tub for an hour, and then wear them while they dry. they will fit great on you, have a nice deep blue color, and you can wear them in yourself. im wearing a pair right now and im not ridiculously skinny but they feel really comfy and look fine.

theyre only like $50 too

sleep it's easier cause you get a cross section of like a million brands

I have always appreciated how Shasta is to jeans as M. White is to martinis

as you are to righteous anger at everyone over 40

the best way to "shrink to fit" is to wear the jeans when you are in the tub and bend forward (to exaggerate the "anti-fit" of the rise) and bending your knees, then wear to dry in the sunshine.

but that's just me. :-P

no one said cutoff yet?

steve's way is probably better i would just feel weird sitting in a tub of blue water in my jeans--also steve dont you lose more indigo if you get them wet right-side-out? i soaked mine inside out because i thought it would retain more dye

1) unless you're buying LVC, levi's 501xx is synthetic indigo (chemical) and is more colorfast than natural indigo vegetable dye, not a problem.

2) wet is wet, the chemical bonding process of cotton and indigo is not indicative of whether the garment is inside or out. once the dye washes out of the warp threads, it's out. that's why your weft threads only get crock (bleed/stain) if you sweat (salinity) or introduce another element other than h2o (lol, urine or booze most commonly).

Uniqlo jeans are excellent and 2 pairs for £39.99.

hmmm... yeah i don't totally understand much of this thread other than vaguely what Mark C just said. Plz rspct, I'm a Brit and I actually have to go to bloody London to get clothes because otherwise it's chavgear all the way, and I generally go to Topman in Ox Street cos I'm uncultured and poor (but not chav, hmm...). There is a TK Maxx near me though and that's ok I suppose. Would be nice to find a half-decent place in London that is not Topman that doesn't sell shit clothes or really really pricey clothes. EDUCATE!

i spilled grits on my levi's the other day

(thanks for the advice steve shasta!)

I think you can just about find 501s in the UK. You'll find them in the bigger towns, the ones with McDonald's and things.

You don't need to do the shrink to fit stuff. If you are a regular sized human male the normal 501s will fit fine.

why did America's TJ MAXX become Britain's TK MAXX? What is it in France, le TL MAXX?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TK_Maxx

The first TK Maxx opened in Bristol in 1994. [1] In 2006, the 210th store opened. TK Maxx's United States parent company, T.J. Maxx, adopted the name TK Maxx to avoid confusion with the existing but separate discount chain T J Hughes[citation needed].

caek,

i'm sorry but i need to correct you when you say that shrink to fits and pre-washed 501s fit the same way as that is not true.

non-XX/non-shrink-to-fit 501s are constructed using laundered denim. take a look at where the yoke meets the top block and you see how the denim weave on the yoke is perpindicular to the weave on the rest of the jean. laundered denim will not change much post-denim.

shrink to fit XX denim WILL change and the entire basis of the 501 look is based on the "anti-fit" of the way the square top block, yoke and rise all meet together and interact with each other during the shrinking process.

"will not change much post-denim." = "will not change much post-production."

i love that everyone calls you steve

i have had great luck with AG pants lately, but i am sorta on the thin side and i mostly wear cords

Listen to Shasta -- what you're looking for in shrink-to-fit is contour ON THE BIAS, that is, diagonal to the weave. That's where you get your extra room and custom fit.

I will not be satisfied until I see some integrals and matrix algebra and shit

I can't believe some people are suggesting tapered legs.

i can't believe that you haven't noticed that everybody and their mother are wearing skinny jeans that have... yes, tapered legs.

do you live in metropolitan europe or coastal america?

And skinny jeans are the only ones that look halfway okay with tapered legs. Everything else and it looks like you just stepped out of the trailer park.

what are those horrible levis that have a roomy waist but skinny legs? i tried some on when i was looking for just no-nonsense straight-leg jeans. they were comical. (i found them online. they're called "slouch skinny." bad combo.)

perry ellis makes nice, unobtrusive jeans.

Uniqlo jeans are excellent and 2 pairs for £39.99. <-- Grozart, there are two of these on Oxford St, they are good for jeans. Rubbish mens socks and undies tho'.

I thought 501s were only for if you were ridiculously skinny. Or maybe it's just that I can't imagine anyone else wanting their measurements stamped on the back of their trousers for all to see.

The last few times I've been out I've been aware of being the only person there in last year's baggy flare jeans while all the kids were in skinny straight/tapered jeans, so I went to buy some new ones and all the women's jeans in the shops I went in were still flared a bit.

I thought low waists were supposed to be going out too, but again no evidence of that in the clothes shops I was in (but then I have less than zero dress sense or fashion awareness, I don't live somewhere with many cool boutiquey clothes shops and I wouldn't know where they were or dare to go in if I did, so yeah, I am mainly talking Next here, it seems to be the only place where I can buy anything that fits these days).
PLEASE GOD let this happen, I am fat and short and nobody needs to see my midriff, even "short fit" trousers are several inches too long, and they all have this weird cut (or I do, I suppose) that makes them too tight round the front while 3" of spare material billows unrearrangeably out at the back and you have to bunch it up with a belt just to stop worrying that everyone's staring down the back of yr jeans. Enough...

I don't give two shits about whether or not they're fashionable or not, I like flares and think they suit me far better than any other fit. I know I shouldn't buy them from Gap for a whole bunch of reasons but simply for the sake of simplicity and convenience that's what I've been doing for years. And now they've stopped fucking doing flares at all. Alternatives pls?

I used to wear 501s as a teenager/early 20-something and I was never skinny and they fitted okay, a bit shapeless I thought.

Steve, I've never shrunk to fit, but I'm sure your right you'd get a better fit that way. You are to jeans as G00blar is to Philip Roth. In my defense, I was careful not to say they give the same fit. Just that pre-shrunk are more than fine for people used to other jeans.

I figured I'd keep this simple for grozart, who currently gets his jeans at Top Shop (Have you seen a recent issue of the NME? It's like that, but a shop with clothes). A good pair of regular 501s will probably fit better than any jeans he's ever owned.

But back to jean-science, I've worn 501s for as long as I can remember, but I've never done the bathtub thing. I should try.

I'm just amazed that anyone would buy new blue jeans at full price when second-hand jeans are comfier, more broken-in and available in a very wide selection of fits and sizes for like 20 bucks tops

Honestly, I think the last time I bought a new pair of jeans was when I was like 12

Actually my mom bought them

i'm an extreme self-critic when it comes to my body. so i haven't worn any skinny jeans as of yet. but maybe i'm exaggerating, what do you think?

I'm 184 cms tall and weigh about 88 kgs. I think it's too much to be wearing jeans with skinny in their name...these are really for the slimmest of the slim only right?

Only one way to find out, pardner

i'm not posting pics for free

I never owned a pair of new jeans until I moved to NY. And when I finally was forced to, i was so confused by the lowrise fit. I think I got serious crotch strangulation trying to pull jeans above my hips. I have to get some new jeans for the winter and am really dreading it.

Tracer, maybe you should buy your first pair of new jeans and you may find out what you've been missing out on...?

I can do that vicariously through this thread - if I can stand the excitement

you jean savants are a mystery

hey shasta how much should you size up a 501 to get the right fit post shrink? 1"?

what is the true size of your waist?

also, slouch skinny is huge in fringe circles... even streetpeeper agrees!

in japan, they call it the "carrot" fit.

i had a pair of the slouch skinny 520s but i gave them to my brother

On one of the other jeans threads I praised my 539 Levis, and I will do so here as well. They're great.

I've never done the 501 shrink thing, b/c I always assumed I was too big to work it effectively. How would it go for a 38/36 jeans-wearer?

i wear 31s, i've never been measured.

i see slouch skinny all the time on ppl younger and less showered than me. to generalize.

haha i just realized what you all mean by "slouch skinny"

the ones with a saggy ass yet tight around the calves, right? giving the impression that whoever is wearing them either needs a belt or has lost some weight?

I totally ordered a pair of STF 501s just so I could go commando in the bathtub and watch the water turn blue. thanks ILE!