Levi's – Vintage Jeans Sold For £87,000
I found a pair of new but vintage Levi’s in Italy the same week a 19th-century pair sold for $87,000. Why vintage Levi’s hold their value.
This week I found an amazing pair of new but vintage Levi’s here in Italy, in a second-hand shop in Lucca. It is the first pair of denim I own, and I am past fifty. It was the classic oversized red tab that stole my heart, and the oversized red buttons. It’s why I deemed that this week I was wearing Ferrari red Levi’s.
The red tag is iconic.
Two days later I read in the Telegraph about a 19th-century pair which sold for a whopping $87,000 (£76,800). They were left abandoned in a mine in the American West and were covered in white wax from the Victorian miners’ candles. Why would 23-year-old Kyle Haupert, a vintage trader from San Diego, buy them?
“I’m still kind of bewildered, just surprised at myself for even purchasing them.”
My denim Levi’s are turning heads on the streets of Italy. The chunky stitching and the buckle on the back are like no other Levi’s I have ever seen. These jeans are a great example of personal style rather than a fashion statement.
Levi’s legacy will never die
On the fashion front, I found them very boring. But Marilyn Monroe gave them sex appeal. James Dean wore them in a rebellious way.
The King of Rock, Elvis Presley, set the trend by wearing a black pair. Rock legend Bruce Springsteen decided to wear Levi’s for the cover of the Born in the USA album. As for the political rebellion of the time, Mr Tony Blair wore them many times at Number 10.
Why do people opt for the 501s, 511s, 701s or the Ribcage? The red tab, the brown leather patch and the button fly. Few denim brands can claim to be iconic. Levi’s can.
The history
This 150-year-old brand was started by a Bavarian immigrant who sold his blue jeans to California’s Gold Rush prospectors. No matter what gender or age you are, Levi’s is like Coca-Cola. We are all very familiar with wearing it. Like Alexa Chung, Jeremy Clarkson and Barack Obama. Just like Converse, this brand will always be in fashion’s front row, and on Netflix too.
When Levi’s re-released its classic 501 styles with a cropped ankle, Instagrammers (Levi’s has eight million followers) went wild.
Mine are straight leg, but because the denim is so heavy and thick I can wear them any way I like.
They were new when I found them. Years on they are worn, and I still wear them.
Levi’s retail at around £100. The Kick Flares, sadly discontinued, can be found, but you have to hunt for them.
It’s even more extraordinary given that, by 1999, Levi’s was in distress. How did Levi’s crawl back against the competition? We saw Nick Kamen take off his Levi’s in a launderette to Marvin Gaye’s I Heard It Through the Grapevine. This got everyone’s attention for denim.
The Clash had their only UK number one with Should I Stay or Should I Go after it was featured in a Levi’s ad. In the early 1990s, these ads made us fall in love with the brand again.
US students were banned from wearing blue jeans
Denim’s messages were politically powerful throughout Hollywood. US students in the 1950s were banned from wearing blue jeans after a rebellious Marlon Brando sported 501s in The Wild One and made denim seem dangerous.
This is why Levi’s responded by creating white jeans. Denim was also the cult symbol of dissent among Soviet teens in the 1980s.
They have barely changed since. There have been tweaks, such as zip flies and boyfriend styles, and collaborations with hot brands such as Ganni, Vetements and Comme des Garçons. The Kardashians wore Levi’s on their 2017 Christmas card.
Kate Middleton joked in an interview that she only had one poster in her bedroom growing up:
“I had the Levi’s guy on my wall, not a picture of William, sorry.”
Levi’s has stayed true to what it is. The denim brand has bridged the gap between young and old throughout the years. No one judges you if you’re wearing Levi’s.
Why invest in vintage
It’s why vintage ones have held their value. In 2021 Levi’s ran a campaign with this line:
“Buy Better, Wear Longer.”
In 2018, an 1893 pair sold for almost $100,000 to a buyer in Asia, while 1970s pairs upcycled by the brand Re/Done retail for upwards of £600.
Levi’s introduced its own slow fashion scheme in 2020 to buy back customers’ used jeans, fix them up and resell them. The brand has started using organic and recyclable cotton.
Levi’s is like Rome. It will last forever. And as this week showed, the right young buyer will pay more for a pair of Levi’s than for a basic Audi.
Can Levi’s be preserved 7,200 feet under the surface of a miner’s gravesite?
