Levi Strauss CEO warns against washing jeans
Levi Strauss CEO Chip Bergh had some style advice for 501 fans recently at Fortune’s Brainstorm Green conference: Stop washing your jeans.
“These jeans are maybe a year old, and these have yet to see a washing machine,” the denim honcho said of the pair he wore during a chat onstage. “I know that sounds totally disgusting.”
Erick DeLeon, manager of Minneapolis men’s clothing boutique MartinPatrick3, said whether to wash your denim “has been making headlines lately, which is funny to me because to me it was always obvious.” A good pair of jeans will age better — and fit better — if unwashed for as long as possible, he said. Tossing your jeans into the washing machine along with detergent will break down the denim faster.
DeLeon offered these tips to keep your denim dapper, but not disgusting:
1. Don’t wash, do fold. “Once I get home for the day I fold them up and put them back in the closet.”
2. Spot treat stains.
3. If your jeans get smelly, try putting them in the freezer (seriously!) for 24 hours to kill bacteria. Or try a product made specifically for freshening up denim, such as retaW or Mr. Black Denim Refresh.
— Aimee Blanchette
Minneapolis Star Tribune
Hints from Heloise:
Fan grilles are cleaned at self-service carwash
J.M. writes via email: Each summer when I bring out my fans, I take off the grilles by removing the screws, and wipe the blades with a damp cloth. Then I take the grilles to the self-service carwash and secure them in the clamps provided for car mats. A quick high-pressure spray cleans all the dirt and grime in those crevices. Be careful to dry the grates completely before putting them back on.
— King Features
Childhood study traces sensitivity to allergens
Childhood exposure to allergens and germs is generally believed to protect against the development of asthma and allergy, but a new study suggests that this happens only within the first year of life.
Researchers studied 560 children at high risk for asthma, giving them yearly exams and testing their homes for bacteria and cat, dog, cockroach, mouse and dust mite allergens. The study, several of whose authors have received funds from pharmaceutical companies, appears in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology.
By age 3, 44 percent of the children were sensitized to at least one allergen, and 36 percent had recurrent wheezing. Overall, the more exposure children had to cockroach, mouse and cat allergens, the higher their risk for wheezing.
But timing was important. Only 17 percent of those exposed to all three allergens during the first year of life had recurrent wheezing, compared with 51 percent of those exposed to none of them. Children who were free of allergies and wheezing tended to have the highest first-year exposure to both allergens and bacteria.
The information may help develop preventive strategies, said an author, Dr. Robert A. Wood, a professor of pediatrics at Johns Hopkins.
— Nicholas Bakalar
New York Times