Whether you are reading The Style Examiner for the first time or you have been following it for a while, chances are that you subconsciously regard style as a physical embodiment of a cool, calm and collected state of mind best experienced when wearing clothes that make you feel both comfortable and confident. Quite often, such a state of self-assurance starts by wearing garments that remain timeless in their contemporary approach to style. Personally, very few items of clothing conjure this idea as a pair of dark-blue regular-cut jeans.
Despite the pervasive dominance that skinny and slim fit jeans in the most diverse colours and washes have imposed on men’s sartorial options over the last few years, it is the regular cut model in a shade of dark indigo that offers the best dressing options to the urban male professional. A pair or dark denim jeans can be versatile enough to be worn during many work situations and complement an elegant look for a night out. However, finding the right jeans that match this profile is not always easy.
While trawling through what seemed like an endless list of websites that search engines seamlessly chain together, my research eventually reached an end when I came across the Replay Jeans at Mainline Menswear, and particularly the Replay Willham Vintage Regular Jeans model.
Despite featuring what can be described as a standard fabric for jeans (a 12.5oz dark blue flat finish denim in 100% cotton) and details that one would normally expect in this sort of garment (namely, embossed buttons on the fly and five pockets – including two at the front with a small coin slot within the right pocket), the Willham is part of the new Replay clothing and jeans collection that features discreetly stylish details such as a logo stitched on the front left pocket and a cream woven trim on a front and reverse belt loop with red stitching.
I ordered them swiftly and had them delivered within a couple of days. Once they arrived, I tried them on and the first thing that impressed me was the softness of the fabric. Following my credo that jeans only fit properly after being washed at least once, I put them through a regular washing machine cycle and allowed them to dry normally. Once they were ready to be worn again, I noticed that the feel, colour and fit had not changed at all, which was surprisingly good news. Furthermore, after wearing them out a couple of times with white shirts, I could not find any signs of staining whatsoever.
In a nutshell, finding the right pair of dark jeans that makes you feel stylish may be difficult and time-consuming but it’s certainly not impossible. And once you find them you may end up behaving just like I did with my Replay Willham jeans: wearing them for days on end, safe in the knowledge that I now know where I can go back for more.