Viberg Ripple Sole Oxford

I've been advocating for Superdenim before, and I'll probably be doing it again, as they are doing very, very well. At the moment they are starying a bit off the path, that they followed to begin with, which is good in a way, but I just never hope, that they stop carrying hard-to-find Japanese brands like The Real McCoy's.

I have also praised the Oxford model from Viberg before. It's beautiful, extremely well-made and very wearable.

So when I saw, that Superdenim had just released 4 new Oxfords, I got pretty excited. Each and everyone of them could easily become a wardrobe stable with me and m, however the price might just prove to be a stumbling block.

My favourite is - of course - the one with the ripple sole (by Vibram), which is quite in mode at the moment, but very few people realize, that it dates back to the 50's and was used in the US army. The Ripple Sole was also used on some nice Viberg make-ups for both Inventory and Leffot. 

Other than the sole it features some very nice details such as the brass eyelets on the rough out suede and the laces are some of the nicest ever.

I have some personal information about the Viberg Oxford, that I would really like to share, however this will happen sometime next week..

One Month of Denim - Day 26

These are the hands of a passionate man

We are getting closer and closer to the end of this marathon. I'm almost out of things, that I want to write about, but I think I'll make it. Then we will take a long break from denim, unless something amazing is uncovered in the deserts of Arizona or something sensational happens.

That sensational thing happening could be coming from the English brand Tender Co. and I would be foolish to not include Tender in a write up on denim - especially on modern denim -, as I see this brand as one of the most innovative.

So what makes Tender more innovative than others or rather should I say, what makes Tender so great? That might seem like a fairly easy question to answer, but there are many things that you need to include in order to answer that question fully.

This list might give some perspective to why Tender is so great. In no particular order of course.

1. William Kroll seems like friendliest man alive. Probably also one of the most passionate and creative.

2. Everything is cut a sewn in England using small factories and artisans - you can take this literally

3. The use of natural dyes like woad dye (I type of indigo dye), logwood and weld

4. The use of full grain leather that has been oak tanned in England by an amazing tannery called JF Baker - (I have used this leather myself and I have to say it is the best belt leather, I have used)

5. The overly excessive use of small, well-thought details - for instance the "snob's thumb pocket"

6. Not necessarily making slim, basic 5 pocket jeans a la the New Standard

7. Custom made (in England) wax cast solid brass buttons

8. Custom made (in England) wax cast belt buckles of very original designs.

9. Tender has a piece of soap in their assortment

10. Small, well curated collection - that grows organically

11. Collaboration with Hickorees Hard Goods in New York - Don't you love this?

12. Loopwheeled t-shirts with print or hand dyed

13. The level of almost full disclosure through the Tender thread on Superfuture. Definitely worth a couple of hours of browsing due to the pictorials posted by William himself

14. Ingenious construction of the garments - bias cut and one-piece cut

15. The introduction of sheepskin mittens in the collection and small runs of denim aprons

16. Beautiful print illustrations done by an old artist named Dorrit Dekk

17. For having a wall clock as a prime feature on the website

18. You can ask him anything in the Superfuture thread, and he will probably provide answers for more than you asked

19. Do you need more reasons? Really?

20. If you need more, watch this film

I wouldn't mind a pair of these, although my taste is probably a bit too conventional (boring) to pull them off on a daily basis.

Recommended Reading - Tools

The Japanese book "Tools - Real Stuff for Future Classics" has been featured on many sites already and with good reason. It's a great book with a lot of inspiring goods, that you'll be wanting to ad to your collection. I bought the book based on the recommendations that I had read, and I wasn't disappointed. I was pleasantly surprised by the fact that I already owned a lot of the products featured in the book, and the ones I didn't already have, I wanted.

The Perfect Sweatshirt - The Real McCoys

One of the brands that has been getting more and more attention lately is The Real McCoys and they deserve it. They really do. They continue to push the boundaries of reproduction, details and quality. If you want to learn more about them, I recommend you pick up Inventory Magazine issue #2

Take this sweatshirt, that one might feel insinuated to call the perfect sweatshirt. Solid construction, great details, made in Japan and last but not least, amazing loopwheeled fabric. At £180 it may seem a bit expensive, but the fabric will last for years, while improving with wear and you know what they say; you only buy quality once.

One Month of Denim - Day 1

This might be a huge project, but I figured that I would make September a month of denim. Therefore I intend to make 1 post a day on the subject of denim and I will be doing it in a random order. Some posts will of course be longer than others, as I have more time on some days. This is an introduction to the subject of denim, but I hope there will also be some for the denim connoisseur.

I'm mainly doing this because the denim culture in Denmark is pretty weak and hopefully this will inspire some Danes to dig deeper into denim history and culture.

To hit things off I would like to recommend some reading on the subject of denim.

Paul Trynka has written a great little book called "From Cowboys to Catwalks", which is one of the best introductions to denim if you know some, or very little. And by that I don't mean that you won't be referring to it after a while because you probably will. It should also be mentioned that Paul Trynka is very easy to get hold of, if you have any denim related questions, as he is a very active and most helpful user on the two big fashion fora - Superfuture and Styleforum. You'll most likely find him in the threads about Levi's Vintage Clothing (LVC for people in the know).

It should also be said that Superfuture is a great source for information, as there are many people who has a genuine interest and a lot of knowledge, but you have to remain sceptic.

The denim collector and denim hunter, Michael Harris, has written a great and extremely inspiring book on pre 1900 denim called "Jeans of the Old West". Though the subject may be a bit niche, it gives you a totally different aspect to wearing denim. Michael has been hunting denim in the Arizona desert for a long time and he has been trying to recreate the history of the old denim companies together with his wife. Levi's weren't the only company making dungarees and the book covers some of the forgotten companies, but it also focuses on Levi's and the book tries to put together the puzzle that is Levi's pre 1906, when the company was hit by a fire after a big earthquake. Michael Harris has since been working together with the Rising Sun company to create a beautiful pair of jeans that were based on his finds.

David Little wrote a book called "Vintage Denim" back in the 90's. The book is quite good and can also be used as an introduction to the subject. At some point it was an collector's item of sorts, but you can sometimes find it relatively cheap on eBay.

If you want more material on denim, you need to buy expensive Japanese Magazines (or rather books) like Lightning magazine, Mono or Free & Easy. All have fortunately been getting a bigger distribution lately - check Sivletto and Superdenim for instance.

Hopefully I'll be able to make similar months on different subjects. But let's see how this goes first, as I feel this is a rather big task.