By Kristen Philipkoski / Source: Eat, Sleep, Denim

The most important thing to know about Talley is that if you see something you like, you better snap it up quick. It could be discontinued without warning at any moment because each design is a limited edition model and available only while it seems relevant to the brand’s creative director, Ben Talley Smith. The coolest thing about Talley is that each pair of jeans comes with its own birth certificate and garment identification number. When you order a pair, you’ll get an email update at every step in the jean-creation process.

Smith launched the eponymous brand of men’s and women’s jeans late last year, after doing time with some serious names including Alexander Wang, Aritzia, Rag & Bone/JEAN, Helmut Lang, Marc by Marc, 3×1 and Vince.

The business is mostly online, but the brand hosted its first pop up in LA a month ago, so look for more of those potentially in NYC and LA (Smith is bicoastal) this year. Read on for more about Smith’s affection for laundry, his love of ’90s supermodels, and the exaggerated reports of skinny jeans’ death.

What was the thought process behind deciding to release new denim designs weekly? Was it partly because trends are moving so quickly these days?

“It seemed interesting to provide newness as much as possible so launching items every week seemed interesting. Being online only currently we don’t have to abide by season or specific deliveries, our only goal is to promote product we like. It allows us to continually design new items and washes and give the customer something special every week. Something to look forward to.”

Will the designs be available for a limited time only? Will some designs be available continuously?

“No, we are building the line so for the time being everything is available until we feel its relevance is no longer necessary for the collection.”

Will you release one men’s and one women’s design weekly?

“Yes, we are doing one of each every week. Either a new wash or fit.”

How will the customer’s ability to track each order work? And what made you want to offer this amount of transparency?

“We update customers every few days with the real time status of their jean. Anytime a jean moves from stage to stage (cutting to sewing, sewing to laundry) we update the customer with interesting facts on where there jean is as well as the people involved.
I wanted to show what goes into the process because it is so hands on. Every jean is made almost 100% by someone’s hands, so I really wanted to showcase that to the end consumer. So they take pride in what they wear.”

Read more @ Eat, Sleep, Denim