By @FionnualaMcNult
I’m sure we’ve all heard that joke from relatives, “You've got a hole in your jeans, did you know?” or “You need to patch up those jeans” but this just makes MOM jeans look that much cooler and trendy. However, sometimes you can end up paying even more for jeans with holes in them, which does not make sense to me, why pay for something you could just as easily do yourself. You can't go wrong with cutting a hole in a pair of jeans. However, it's mastering how to add freys and make them look distressed just as if you’d picked them up from the high street. I have found 5 different ways you can make your jeans go from boring to the main character in a matter of minutes. You can combine all of the techniques together or do them each separately to get your desired look. Get your old jeans ready, you're about to give them the biggest glow up ever.
Photo credit: Unsplash
Dye the fabric
If you really enjoy the look of faded jeans that have been put through the wash a few times then this will be the hack for you. You can achieve this look by mixing 50-50 water and bleach, be very careful with this and ensure you do not get it on your hands or face. The best way to achieve a precision look and make sure it is on every part of the jeans is to use a paint brush and paint on the solution, try to paint it on the areas that would fade naturally for example the knees. Try to leave them overnight but check on them every so often so that they do not go too light make sure the seams and edges are thoroughly coated as these parts of the jeans tend to be darker and therefore harder to dye. When you have your desired colour you can pop them in the wash and then dry them if they are as light as you want them you can then get to the fun part if not you can repeat this step a few times until they are right for you.
Fray the edges
There are many different ways to fray jeans and most of the time the tools you need to do this are lurking around your home so don’t think you have to be searching on amazon for the latest jean distress tool. One home product you can use to create a ripped effect is a razor, choose the desired area, i would recommend the knees or thigh areas for this as they tend to look best. You then need to begin shaving your jeans, which may sound odd but use the motions you would if you were shaving to create a frayed effect. You can be as subtle or as bold as you like to get creative! Another tool you can use which is around your house is a pair of scissors, split the scissors in two and begin to scrape the jeans. It will slowly begin to fray and again this can be as big or as small as you like.
Use bobby pins to create holes
I’m sure somewhere in your house is a lone bobby pin just waiting to be put to good use, if you want to make your jeans look even more distressed then get searching for that bobby pin. Decide on the area you would like the rips to be. The most popular place is at the knees but you can put them anywhere and make them as big or small as you like. Take your bobby pin and poke a hole in the denim wiggle and pull until the hole is bigger and begin to scrape at the material to get a frayed look, you can put as many of these rips in your jeans as you like the more the merrier a variety of sizes gives it that ‘off the shelf’ look.
Pluck to make larger holes
If you really want to make a statement and are not afraid of big over the top rips in your jeans then grab a pair of scissors. Cut two horizontal strips about an inch apart, the longer the strips the longer the hole will be. Take a pair of tweezers and begin to pluck out only the blue thread. By doing this you can create the frayed white horizontal lines that you see on most ripped jeans on the high street. If you love the messy look you can rip some of the white thread to create even more distress.
MORE: Five different ways to mix and match blazers and jeans
Use sandpaper for softness
One final way to upgrade your old jeans is to use some sandpaper, which may not sound the most conventional way to rip jeans but it does work. This is perfect for a subtle look, simply take the sandpaper and rub on the jeans until it starts to fray or begins to look worn, it depends on the look you are going for. If you would like the make the fabric look more soft after adding rips again the sandpaper is the perfect way to give a smoother look to the jeans, the softer you want the look you should choose a less coarse type of sandpaper.
Tagged in jeans fashion Fashion Trends