#56 | Olé Denim 306 13oz Fades

It seems like forever since the days of leaving the house to work at the office or meet friends and family for food and drinks. Though I miss the social interactions the most, I'm getting tired of wearing loungewear regularly. I switch in and out of the same clothes regularly consisting of adidas track pants, pullover hoods and could use more button-ups and denim in my life. As I reflect on my wardrobe, I took a peek at some jeans that I wear to the grocery store on a weekly basis and began to think back on my memories with them. I've always loved that raw denim's rips, tears and fades take you back to a certain time of your life and give you a feeling, similarly to a photograph. You might be saying to saying to yourself "Wow Ryan, you're weird", and I'd agree with you but let me tell you what this article of clothing has been through.

This is my pair of Olé Denim 306 13oz jeans. I've owned these since 2015 and have worn them a couple of times a week regularly since 2016. These used to be a deep indigo when I first purchased them and my plan was to wear these as my "travelling pants". Before I had the chance to wear them on a trip I broke my ankle and wanted to still wear denim, so I paired them with a pair of black New Balance 574's and some crutches. After I got through physio, I was ready to do some exploring and booked some trips taking these to Vancouver, Las Vegas, China, Philippines, Malaysia and Indonesia later that year. That was my first time leaving North America making it even more memorable.

After that year, I figured it was best to beat these up and wear these hard so I found myself skateboarding in them, "dancing" at club and skating at the ODR. At this point they weren't only my travelling pants but a faded casual pair that I would wear during evenings and weekends. As you can see in the photos above, we now see that they've lost a fair bit of that natural indigo where the jeans crease and are worked like the whiskers (front thighs), honeycombs (behind the knees) and the pockets. Though these are great quality, they aren't indestructible. I've had a couple of crotch blowouts and rips in my pockets which only added character. I was concerned that they'd get larger if they weren't cared for. Wear, care and repair.

You can see here that I decided to do some sashiko repairs to add some more character to the jeans and continue to do as they become more worn. I worked with my good friend Sengshiko to work on some of these designs. I remember this being quite important because I had a couple more trips planned and I wanted to have them fixed up in advance. So prior to Covid-19, I've also worn these to Toronto, Costa Rica, Mexico, Tokyo, India, Portland and a few other places in North America. Some of these trips you may have seen on this blog.

Thanks for letting me nerd out a bit and maybe I'll even share some other pairs of denim I've worn over the years. I can't wait for the day that we're all able to travel, grab beers and roam around safely. Until then, these are going to be my grocery shopping jeans.

Yours Truly

#42 | Behind the Scenes with Olé

Just the other week I spent time with Brayden and Alan shooting one half of our Olé lookbook. We had the idea of photographing the lifestyle of two individuals in two different cities. It is important to us that Olé can fit in one's life no matter what the world can throw at them. Take a look at what we did with JJ and stay tuned for the full lookbook.

Follow more of Olé here.

Yours Truly

#41 | Olé Denim Samples

The sample process has been a very long but rewarding procedure for us but thanks to our suppliers, producers, Chris and Dallas, we have slowly developed something that we as consumers want to wear and as businessmen are happy and proud to share with the public. As we now go into the final production stages, I want to thank everyone for their support and interest and want to let you know that 2015 is a big year for Olé. We are happy that there are people out there who are as excited as we are! Shout out to Joey Visser for the all of the photos.

Follow our story at @oledenim.

Yours Truly

#21 | First Olé Denim Samples

As I mentioned in one of my first posts, I had been working on a new jean company prior to starting this blog. My partners Dallas, Chris and I have been working on our jean company Olé for about a year and a half now. We've done a lot of work from meeting connects to completing a marketing plan. Well just this last week we received our first set of samples. I think we had dealt with three denim mills prior to selecting Kuroki and been in talks with a few factories before selecting the one we are now working with.

When I received this pair, I was incredibly excited and everyone could tell. I was stoked that we were one step closer to production and have been patiently working with that in mind. When I had the jeans in my hand they were very impressive. The stitching was fantastic, the fabrics were better quality than I imagined and the Ken Diamond patch went well with the rich indigo colour. Sadly, the fit was exactly what I feared. Out pattern that we created didn't quite match what we had in mind, but I'm not yet worried. Chris is really good at what he does as a designer and has managed to come up with an idea of how to perfect the fit from understanding the taper to understanding exactly how we will get there.

With some hard work we will have our second set of samples sooner than later. I've noticed that people have been curious about this process and if you have any questions at all, feel free to ask! Or maybe our Instagram account can answer them for you.

Yours Truly