{"resolved":true,"match_type":"uuid","source_type":"original_book","book_id":"1dc0854c-957b-4fb1-af9a-bb4fdb76b77e","title":"Time, Consumption and Everyday Life Practice, Materiality and Culture","author":null,"edition":null,"publisher":null,"year":null,"isbn":null,"requested_by":"printed_page","book":{"source_type":"original_book","book_id":"1dc0854c-957b-4fb1-af9a-bb4fdb76b77e","id":"1dc0854c-957b-4fb1-af9a-bb4fdb76b77e","uuid":"1dc0854c-957b-4fb1-af9a-bb4fdb76b77e","title":"Time, Consumption and Everyday Life Practice, Materiality and Culture","normalized_title":"timeconsumptionandeverydaylifepracticematerialityandculture","author":null,"edition":null,"publisher":null,"year":null,"isbn":null,"isbns":[],"parsed":true,"ai_readable":true,"document_type":"book","page_count":236,"navigation_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/ai/book/1dc0854c-957b-4fb1-af9a-bb4fdb76b77e","title_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/ai/title/Time%2C%20Consumption%20and%20Everyday%20Life%20Practice%2C%20Materiality%20and%20Culture","fixed_page_url_template":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/ai/book/1dc0854c-957b-4fb1-af9a-bb4fdb76b77e/page/{printed_page}","path_api_url_template":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/api/ai/book/1dc0854c-957b-4fb1-af9a-bb4fdb76b77e/page/{printed_page}","read_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/api/ai/read/1dc0854c-957b-4fb1-af9a-bb4fdb76b77e","page_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/api/ai/books/1dc0854c-957b-4fb1-af9a-bb4fdb76b77e/page","search_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/api/ai/books/1dc0854c-957b-4fb1-af9a-bb4fdb76b77e/search"},"page":{"printed_page":158,"pdf_page":157,"physical_index":157,"physical_index_base":0,"printed_page_status":"recognized","page_sha256":"52157eb95c5ce2b1cb45444a6aeaaa99ee500588ff127fe0943f157c95818d33"},"chapter":"List of Tables and Figures","content":"Instead industry has developed a wide range of techniques to simulate the effects of jeans having been worn. The very first distressed jeans were sold as stone-washed. The method of washing them with a large pile of pumice stones is still common today, though it is increasingly supplemented by cellulase enzymes, which are natural proteins that may used to obtain a stone-washed look. Apart from stone wash, one can opt for acid wash, moon wash, monkey wash, show wash, white wash and mud wash. Chemicals such as potassium permanganate are applied to shift the tinting. Resins may be used to set creases at particular places in the jeans. There is ozone fading or water jet fading. There are various forms of sandblasting, or handsanding, either on a flat surface or on dummies. Typical special effects including whiskering, that is, crease lines around the crotch, which can be produced with lasers, or by sandblasting, handsanding or abrasive rods. If one wants really fancy results, there are more elaborate methods. For example a laser beam can be passed through a shaped mask that comprises an aperture of the desired shape and is then deflected by a mirror to strike the textile substrate (Denim Academy n.d.; ExpressTextile, 20 March 2003)\n\nOne of the main effects that all of these methods are trying to copy is actually a fortuitous result of the nature of denim. Denim is a twill textile in which indigo-dyed warp threads are woven with white weft threads. The warp dominates the surface, which is why jeans appear blue on the outside and mainly white on the inside. As jeans are worn through, the underlying weft threads become more prominent, giving the characteristic worn effect. Clearly other forms of trousers might become well worn, but this would not be as evident because the warp and weft are of the same colour. So blue jeans lend themselves to the conspicuous display of being worn. But this would only account for one element, not the fraying, tearing and embroidering, and would not explain why we would want them to look worn in the first place.\n\nAs already noted, we do not wish to imagine an actual labourer wearing these jeans. We probably have no more desire to know about lasers, sandblasting and whiskering the crotch either. The clear preference is for all such processing to take place at some point entirely removed from our consciousness. To be conscious of how these effects were achieved would detract from the illusion that the effects are to be attributed to us, the wearer. This lack of consciousness and distancing from method is most acute when we confront evidence that this idea of other people living their lives for us sometimes becomes literally the case. One of the standard methods of distressing jeans is sandblasting. It is a technique that appears to remain quite common in small unregulated workshops in places such as Istanbul. Recently it has been found that young men who work in these conditions have been contracting silicosis (Akgun et al. 2005; Cimrin et al. 2006). In such cases someone really has given his life so that we are able to purchase our denim jeans with the illusion of spending some of our life in their wearing out. At a more general level, distressing of jeans is associated with high levels of pollution. For example, a report in the Guardian (17 August 2007, p. 25) called ‘Distressed Denim Trend Costs Mexican Farmers the Earth’ tells of the area of Tehuacan in Mexico, a place once famous for natural springs and health water but now heavily polluted.\n\n158\n\nDaniel Miller","previous_page":null,"next_page":159}