Hi guys, as promised, an update to how the fades were going on the Edwin ED71 jeans. I bought these babies back in Feb, before my trip to Marakech.

Get yourself some raw Edwins here

It has now been exactly 6 months and they’ve been my go to pair for all that time. I absolutely love them. For the price, which I think you can buy online for around £110, they are a bargain. I have paid the same, or more over the last few years for denim made by popular brands that have beenway inferior to these. You cant fault the heavy Japanese denim feel.

These jeans felt great from day one and just got better and better. They hardly stretched at all and just became softer and more moulded to my body.

They were saniforized so I just grabbed a pair that fit me right of the bat.

The Edwins have now been rinsed twice – once on purchase to remove the excess die (highly recommended) and a second after I spilt 2 cups of coffee on them and I them and I started to smell like a barista. Each time the jeans kept their raw feel and did not shrink. See my post on rinsing raw denim here.

Check them out on Amazon here (affiliate) Edwin ED-71 Slim Red Selvage Denim 14oz – When I last looked they were £115. Remember to get the raw red selvedge versions as there a number of new styles in this popular cut.

I am now going to wash them inside out on a gentle 30° cycle using an A.P.C. fine fabric soap made by AESOP. Not sure if you can still buy it, but I highly recommended for woollens and delicates. It has an amazing peppery aroma and is more masculine than mainstream wool detergents that smell fake flowery.

As you can see, the fades are perfect and subtle with some great whiskers formed in the crease area. These actually appeared early on in the breaking in period and just got more defined with age.

Here is a close up of some great fades around the buttons…
And some of the backside…
So there we have it – 6 months of solid wear and a great looking pair of Edwins. They are going in the wash now as here in the UK we are having a heat wave and the jeans are starting to take on a life of their own!

Here is the Amazon affiliate link Edwin ED-71 Slim Red Selvage Denim 14oz so you can check them out.

I’ll post some post-wash photos shortly.

I guess the next thing is, what will the next pair be. I always need a raw denim project on the go. Let me know if you have any suggestions or favourites.

Check out the latest Edwin denim collection at Liberties

Enjoy the summer!

I get a lot of enquiries about washing raw denim too soon, so I thought I’d write a quick post on my experiences.

Unfortunately, once raw denim has been washed using a washing machine, the cotton fibres break down and permanently change. The die also becomes set. This means that if you pulled the trigger and washed them too soon, the colour will pretty much remain uniform for the rest of the jeans life.

Check out the latest denim collection at Liberties

There will be fading in the high-friction areas such as the thigh and back pocket area over time, but not to the same speed and degree of contrast as if the jeans had been left to be worn unwashed for 6 months or so. This makes the whole process of wearing in the jeans all that more important.

I currently own two pairs of jeans that were washed too soon, one a pair of A.P.C.’s and the other some Natural Selections.

Natural Selection

These are almost two years old and have had a fair amount of use. They were washed after 3 months. As usual, I became impatient and wanted to shrink the jeans a little as they had stretched out. They are made from very soft Italian selvedge denim. They were a 36″ waist (I am normally a 34″) and in the shop and were fairly snug fit. However the soft denim stretched out unusually quickly. I like the jeans now but they could have been a lot better if I had left them longer. Also, now knowing how much they stretched, I should have gone for the 34″ pair. You can see from the photos that the fading is fairly uniform and unspectacular.

 A.P.C. New Standard

These jeans were a disaster from the get go and I regret buying them! I only say this because I just don’t like the cut – they are way too loose around the calf. They are made from Chinese selvedge denim, which goes very very  soft after its first wash and stretches a ridiculous amount very quickly.

I was not aware of this when I bought them but subsequent research on the web confirms you must size down a lot with these jeans. They had about 2 months light wear before washing. Regrettably I washed  them way too soon as the stretching had gone crazy and they had become unwearable, like some 80’s pair of 501’s. Some slight fading and the odd whisker had occurred before washing, but not enough. Now they just look awful and I have to be honest, the quality of the denim is pretty poor. I’ll probably give these jeans away as they just don’t get worn now.

Not All Selvedge is the SAME…

Prior to the A.P.C’.’s pair and the NS, I have always bought jeans made from Japenese selvedge denim. It tends to be a very tough durable denim that stretches very little from the outset. I normally go for 16oz denim. If it has been saniforized then you can size to fit and hopefully that will be that. There will be a degree of stretching over the months before the first wash, but not enough to ruin the original look and once washed, will shrink back a little.

Check out the latest denim collection at Liberties

After these two pairs I will never buy non-Japanese denim again, or I’ll seriously think twice about it. The quality is just not the same and brands seem to be jumping on the selvedge/raw denim bandwagon. See my review on the Edwin ED-71‘s. These are still going strong and I love them and the jeans fit great – the fades are looking awesome even after 3 months. These are jeans made by a company that knows how to make denim…