This year’s challenge for “The Refashioners” refashion series is to remake a pair of jeans into something, with the majority of the finished project coming from the source garment, that is, it should be a mainly denim item.

Personally, I rarely work with denim as I do worry that I’d get carried away and end up with something like this (below), that is, something very obviously having been made from a pair of old jeans. It looks a bit strange because there are very few garment types that are typically made from the same heavy denim as jeans are – even denim jackets use lighter weight denim.

So, my target garment for this fabric had to be another pair of jeans. Cut up jeans to make more jeans, you ask? What is the point?

Well, the look I’m hoping to emulate is a designer pair of jeans which is made from… old jeans. These Vetements Fall 2015 jeans originally retailed at $1450 (images borrowed from Net a Porter) and they came in several different styles. The label basically bought up loads of vintage Levi 501s (!!) and cut them up using their own pattern to make an interesting new style.

Key to the look is the ‘pocket within a pocket’ shapes on the back (no actual back pockets), seams down the front and back legs, and uneven, unfinished hems.

These were absolutely everywhere at one time… like you could barely read  a fashion blog without seeing them at some fashion week or other.

I actually read quite a few articles praising these jeans before coming across one that mentioned they use TWO pairs of vintage Levis for each finished pair. Two! Pairs! Of vintage, wearable jeans!

Of course, I’m going to emulate these using something ugly and turning it into something… interesting, if not 100% beautiful.

I started with a pair of ordinary jeans.

These particular jeans are bog standard Marks and Spencer dad-jeans of absolutely no fashion merit of any kind (no vintage Levis were harmed in the making of this project). The only criteria for selection were that they were a little big on me (but not massively outsized) and they are a fairly light wash (so the pocket shapes will show up once the pockets are removed).

I picked these up in my local Cancer Research shop for £2. Bargain!

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