I confess that a couple of times I’ve followed hipster guys wearing precariously sagging pants down the street just to see how they handled the balancing act, as the pants began to inch down past mid-crack. Sometimes their gait would turn cowboy-ish, as they bowed their legs trying to keep the pants at the perfect level. It amazed me how long these guys could go without hiking their pants up, which seemed to be some sort of personal challenge. They could go for blocks, walking the line between cool and the embarrassment of pants around ankles. “How does this work?” I’d ask myself, and wonder if they weren’t wearing some kind of secret suspender. What an amazing fashion statement!

I read in Fashion Bomb Daily that “Sagging, which originated in US prisons due to oversized uniforms and the banning of belts to prevent suicide and other violent acts, somehow parlayed itself into mainstream attire.” Pretty complex stuff going on here.

The New York Daily News recently reported today that Andrew Lewis, 43, of Hamilton Heights in Harlem, had invented a solution to almost-falling-down pants.It seems that he’d spent a lot of time “watching men in drooping trousers struggle to keep them up as they climbed the steps at the 145th St. subway station.” His invention, called “Subs”, work like an old-fashioned garter belt. You fasten them around your waist and then clip the expandable straps that hang down to your pants, adjusting them to whatever level of ‘low-slung’ you like.  You can buy them online through Hatch Ventures and at some Harlem stores.

“‘Sagging is a huge issue in my community,” Lewis told the New York Daily News. “I spent a lot of time observing and I noticed that even for saggers, there is a point which even they’re not comfortable with how their jeans were falling.'”

Lewis hopes his $30 accessory will become popular with young men who want to express themselves with low-lying pants. I love how enterprising Lewis is – closely observing, identifying a potential need, then developing his idea and making it real.  Still, I wonder if he isn’t missing something essential in his design, that has to do with…

…that ineffable thing…

that is…

street fashion…

Read the full story here, or check it out on YouTube.

via BoingBoing

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