(light symphony music with chalk writing on board)
- Welcome to Brain Stuff.
Not to get too personal, but when
did you last wash your jeans?
Whether you're wearing a pair of busted Levi's
or brand new raw denim from some fancy
boutique with a weird name, your pants
are part of a debate that designers and customers alike
have been having for decades, and it's this:
when should you wash your jeans?
Do you need to wash them at all?
Let's look at the basics.
Denim is a kind of cotton with a twill textile weave.
In a twill weave, the thread called the weft,
the cross-wise yarn, passes under at least two warp threads.
Those are the length-wise yarns.
In most jeans, only these warp threads are dyed,
meaning that the other threads,
the weft threads, remain white.
That's why blue jeans are white on the inside.
And that blue shade on the warp threads
comes from a dye called indigo.
Unlike some other dyes, indigo doesn't
penetrate the cotton, you know?
Instead, it sits atop the yarn
on the surface of each thread, and over time,
molecules of the indigo chip away,
causing the fabric to fade, and this fade
is what makes each pair unique,
so much so that the FBI analyzes
denim patterns when tracking criminals.
I mean, put your tin foil hat on.
They're watching your jeans.
The more you wear a pair, the more broken in they become,
and you'll see the appearance of fade patterns.
You know, whiskers on the front,
honeycomb patterns behind the knees, and so on,
and here's where it gets, wait, what show is this?
Not all jeans are created equally, so let's divide them
into two rough categories: washed and raw.
Washed denim is just that, washed after dying to
make the fabric softer and reduce shrinkage.
Sometimes washed denim is artificially distressed
to give it a pre-broken in or worn look.
The fading of raw denim, on the other hand,
happens naturally over time depending on
the activities of the person wearing the jeans.
So the longer you go without washing these jeans,
the more pronounced that fading
pattern becomes, personalizing the pants.
Once you have a pair jeans, you will hear
numerous pieces of advice about caring for them.
So much stuff.
Most of this does not apply across the board.
For example, some companies will ask you to wait
at least six months before washing your jeans
because if you wash them early,
the indigo will wear off uniformly,
robbing you of those unique fade patterns.
And this is the heart of that whole
to wash or not to wash question.
The longer you go without washing a pair of jeans,
the more pronounced that wearing pattern becomes,
and you also preserve the indigo, as well as
the stiff texture of the fiber,
which I hate, but a lot of people are into.
So what happens if you don't wash them?
Great question.
Won't bacteria pile up, turning your entire lower hemisphere
into a plague-ridden cesspool of filth?
Not necessarily.
In 2011, a microbiology student
at the University of Alberta went, get this,
15 months without washing his jeans.
I don't know, may, I don't know if he's single or what.
He tested their bacterial content, along with
the bacterial content of another pair
that had been washed about two weeks beforehand,
and he found almost no difference.
Anyway, if you can't wash them, what do you do
to keep your blue jeans clean?
You'll hear some, some crazy stuff.
Levi's famously recommended freezing your jeans
to kill bacteria and stave off
any funky odors, but that is bunk.
Take them out now if, if they're in your fridge.
Your roommates think you're being weird.
See, microbe expert Stephen Craig Cary says that's a myth.
Most of the bacteria in our pants comes from our skin,
and a lot of these organisms are
pre-adapted to low temperatures.
Instead, Cary recommends using high temperatures.
Think like 121 degrees Celsius for 10 minutes.
He says that will rid the denim of bacteria.
Or, he adds, you could just wash them.
So depending on how often you wear your jeans,
their age, the type of denim, and what you do
while you're wearing them, you really don't have
to wash them as often as, say,
your underwear, which you should be washing.
If you want to get that uber-cool,
unique fading pattern, your best bet really is
to avoid washing them for a while.
And regardless of how carefully you care for
your favorite pair of raw denim jeans,
messes, like life, find a way.
One day, some sort of disaster will strike,
and you'll have to clean your jeans somehow.
Yes, even if that means washing them.
Well, that's it for now.
Thank you for watching.
I know we didn't get into some of the again
very specific care instructions that many
boutique jean manufacturers insist upon,
so your best bet is to check the
brand-specific instructions for your pants.
And one last question: what are your favorite type of jeans?
Are you one of those people who,
like me, didn't wear them for years?
Lemme know in the comments, and, as always,
stay tuned for more Brain Stuff.