The aviator shades as know them today were first developed in 1936 by Bausch & Lomb and branded by Ray Ban. In those days pilots needed a great pair of anti glare sunglasses and Bausch and Lomb’s design attempted to cover the entire range of the human eye and prevent as much light as possible from entering the eye from any angle. The design was modeled from the goggles being worn by the U.S. military. Ray Ban began selling the glasses to the public in 1937.The Aviator became a well-known style of sunglasses when General MacArthur (see pic.) landed on the beach in the Philippines in WWII. Newspaper photographers snapped several pictures of him wearing them. In the 60′s the shades became popular, but it was after the release of the film ” Top Gun ” that the sales of the aviator shades went sky high! Even today the aviator shades are largely unchanged in design and are still standard issue for the military pilots around the world.

One of the coolest wear areas on a pair of worn in dry jeans, are those on the back pockets. For us that says a lot about the person and the importance of the item that person is carrying day in and day out in his back pockets. It’s the consistency that gives the back pockets great abrasions. For me that is my suns can in my left back pocket. I know it isn’t the healthiest thing to do, but hey, it gives my back pocket some nice abrasions.

In 1858 the French Navy introduced the white and navy striped knitted shirt as part of the French navy uniform, because the block pattern of stripes made them easier to spot in the waves when they fell overboard. The original shirt featured 21 stripes, one for each of Napoleon’s victories. The striped shirt soon exported to other navies. Around 1950 the Bertone stripe became a fashion hit, when Hollywood stars like James Dean, Andy Warhol and Marilyn Monroe wore the stripes on the big screen. It became Jean Paul Gaultier’s personal brandings trade mark in the 80′s. And the design of his ‘Le Male’ perfume bottle is tribute to the famous French garment as well.

The flying shuttle was invented by John Kay in 1733 and was one of the key developments in the industrialization of weaving denim. In previous looms, the shuttle was thrown through the warp threads by hand and wide fabrics required two weavers seated side by side passing the shuttle between them. On the flying shuttle Kay mounted wheels and used paddles to shoot the shuttle from one side to the other and back when weaver jerked a cord. Using the flying shuttle, one weaver could weave fabrics of any width more quickly then two could weave with a normal shuttle.

Especially when it comes to wearing a real nice pear of jeans. Derrick our all-time-favourite crimi has caught us attached to the TV screen since we were kids. Oh man, the music, the locations, this hero and his villains, the sunglasses, and least but not last Harry. This week out of a sudden we asked ourselves what kind of jeans, if any, Horst would wear in his leisure hours. So we spend some time on the internet for our research. Finally we retrieved this picture. A bleached chino style seemed to be the ‘Munich Oberinspektors’ favourite choice. As we would say: “Finger weg von der Waffe”.

Bernard Liechtenstein, better known as Rodeo Ben, was a Polish immigrant who came to America with only some money and his portable sewing machine. In 1937 he made his first steps on american ground and decided that he will use the name Ben. In that time Philadelphia was the  centre of the american textile industry. It was there that he opened his tailor shop. After he made his first denim western shirts for a rodeo roadshow, more clients came in and that brought him the recognition. In 1946 the Blue Bell company employed Bernard ( Rodeo Ben ) to develop a jeans line for cowboys, because ordinary jeans did not stand confrontation with the power of the animals. With cooperation of some famous rodeo stars as Jim Shoulders, Freckles Brown and Bill Linderman Ben made some jeans that were tested by cowboys. The thirteenth version was the perfect one.  The 13MWZ (13th, Mans, Western zipper) as Wrangler named it in 1947, was also the first zippered, not button up jeans in the world. Rodeo Ben died in 1979 in his new homeland. He was a true star of western tailoring.

In 1820 Chinese immigrants came to the Gold Mountain(America) for work. They became contract laborers who worked in the goldmines and on the railroads. In 1850 more young Chinese men hoped to make a fortune in America. They were excluded by law for numerous jobs and as a result they started to work in laundries. The Laundries were hot and crowded with grueling working conditions.In 1851 Wah Lee opened the first Chinese hand laundry in the United States. His small, leased storefront in San Francisco had a simple sign: “Wash’ng and Iron’ng.” Within a few weeks, the business had expanded to twenty washermen working three shifts daily. In 1880, 95 precent of San Francisco’s Chinese laundries operated in wooden buildings. White business owners resented the success of Chinese laundries, and lobbied for a law insisting that laundries be situated in brick buildings for safety. The Chinese owners fought back and argued that the law was inherently discriminatory and won. Chinese laundries are now symbols of oppression, and of freedom.

Last sunday we were invited to Jeroen’s 39th birthday party in Maastricht. Jeroen is the singer/ guitarist of the rockabilly band CC Jerome’s Jetsetters. After a couple of beers the band started their gig and we were very impressed by their sound. A great mix of their own songs and some covers of “rockabilly” legends as Johnny “Guitar” Watson, Chuck Berry and so on. Thanks to Jeroen for inviting us!!!!!

Tweed is a very closely woven, rough and unfinished woolen fabric and because of that the tweed jackets and trousers ( traditionally worn by the upper class ) became a very popular choice for hunters and early motorists. The original name of tweed was tweel which means twill in Scots. After a misinterpretation of a handwriting by an englishman tweel became tweed and the name remained ever since. For us a nice tweed hunter jacket and denim goes hand in hand.

Blue Velvet is a master piece from the “father of surrealism films” David Lynch and was made in 1986. The title is taken from the 1963 Bobby Vinton song of the same name. This movie was also the revive of Dennis Hopper’s career. In a cult movie like this you will always find cult music like “in dreams” from Roy Orbison.