A:Well bring back those baggys. (I never throw out things because they seem to recycle trends every 3 years now! My high heel Oxfords from two years are ago are back with a vengeance.)

I have a mantra: men should never wear skinny jeans. I dated for a second a rock singer and he would wear eyeliner and skinny jeans on stage. It grossed me out.

If you want to do the trends, right now it's all about torn up "men's classics" jeans. The Levi's classics with all the tears so big in the late 80s/early 90s. Lighter than past seasons with lots of rips and tears, faded. For men this means the painter/biker jean look, not hip hop baggy but nowhere near skinny either. (For women, boyfriend jeans just like this are in, as are jeggings still - they're going nowhere for Fall, the leather legging is still around this Fall.) Men's jeans
though are still tidier and darker than women's -- you just can't be an adult male out and about in ripped clothes.

There has also been a push for reduction in price. So the heritage feel of the past summer has made it's way into how much jeans should cost. A number of the brands, Levi's, Lee, Wrangler, have made big pushes and gained a lot of ground. As have the catalog brands, J Crew, LL Bean, Land's End. Right now, denim that folks are buying is topping out between $60-$90. For men this was a "return to basics" movement. For women, this is also the the Cheap Monday/Forever 21 effect, where pricing for really trendy everything/denim brought down the price in the market overall. The idea of "premium" denim is out. I still love and will continue to wear my J Brands but that is because they look so good. But denim is denim.

Personally I think jeans should last forever. However you may simply not want to wear a particular style a few seasons from now -- I don't believe in spending on anything you don't love -- if you hate denim, spend as little as possible - that is, spend on the things which are classics or which really work for you and bring in the trends with very little cost investment. That said, my BF got a pair of jeans from Primark, which is like the Target/Kmart of England for 6 pounds and we washed it in cold water and it turned into a 31 waist, 27 inch inseam, no joke. It was hilarious. But in general, whether cheap or pricey, denim should stand up to the test of time. The key is going to
be whether critics say a particular brand shrinks or stretches. Old Navy (Gap's cheapy sister) has a history of stretching out. But at $20 who can argue with it.

So.....I say go a bit higher, $60-$80. Hit up the Levi's and get a distressed pair of classics. Slightly faded, bit of rub away....

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