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Sunday, May 18, 2025

Reader Question: Preppiest Jeans? Or is that an oxymoron?

A Reader Question:

I understand that jeans are never preppy. There are, however, occasions when jeans are handy. What jeans do preps wear should they ever wear jeans?

10 comments:

  1. It's not an oxymoron. Plain, classic Levis.

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  2. Levi's "button-fly" 501's.

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    Replies
    1. Levi's quality is now poor as production has been outsourced to China, Vietnam and Egypt. The exceptions are the limited editions which are made in Japan. Japanese brands such as Full Count and ONI offer much better quality albeit at a higher price but you get what pay for.

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  3. Plenty of preps are still wearing dungarees.

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  4. White 501´s or Wrangler´s 13MWZ for playing polo are great. Anything fancier like Casablanca or even PoloRL is crap, IMHO. Why wear them in any other time?

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  5. I miss my old Levis because I won't purchase any jeans made in the last 20 years due to poor quality cotton and added spandex.

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  6. Pshaw!!! ... I invented the jeans with pearls and espadrilles look.

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  7. Flannel lined for winter snow shoveling.

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  8. Levi's 502 dark indigo

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  9. There is a big difference between a man who occasionally wears jeans around his property for chores, and someone who literally lives in his jeans all the time.
    Of course, the latter category is unfortunately legion in America.

    Culture (or lack of it) plays a role in this jeans decision. For example, my father (a European) never wore or even owned a pair of jeans his entire life – and the same goes for Frank Sinatra from what I’ve heard.

    Anyway, if one wants to wear jeans, then the simpler the better. Nothing distressed, fancy or pre-torn like the kids wear, just basic denim like the pair I own from LL Bean:

    https://www.llbean.com/llb/shop/32865?page=double-l-jeans-natural-fit&feat=men%20jeans-SR0&csp=a&attrValue_0=1703&searchTerm=men%20jeans&pos=8


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