Not Your Grandpa's Seersucker, Cool Denim by Sucker Jeans

By Laura Medina

Fulton Skinny Women's Sucker Jeans

Due to Sucker Jeans' growth spurt and hungry demand, this article has been supplemented from notes and research from an in-depth article by Maggie Winterfeldt's "Sucker Punch," in the Charleston City Paper and a Question-and-Answer" interview, "Behind the Brand, Sucker Jeans," by Motto Agency, a trend-tracking branding agency; and this fashion journalist's very own interviews cobbled together from personal "fly-by-seat" interviews, impromptu phone tid-bits to finally doing a drop-by visit at Sucker Jeans' headquarters in the heart of Downtown Charleston's Fashion Design District on Upper King St. or go watch them in action, www.suckerjeans.com.

Shelby Men's Straight Leg in Action

With Sucker Jeans' phenomenal rise in the jeans industry, this cannot be a comprehensive end all or be all story on Sucker Jeans but a progressive story of a company busting everyone's expectations and assumptions.

Not bad for a two years old brand that had to jump through many a hurdles to becoming a regional fashion powerhouse and a prominent premium denim brand that had already dominated the Southeast and Caribbean and launching quietly on West Coast in San Francisco.

The birth of Sucker Jeans is compiled from research and a sit-down interview with Sucker Jeans' founder and CEO, Cary Weber, former psychologist and professor.

Savannah Bootcut in action.

Over a blurry-eyed business brunch in The Palm's Hotel and Resort in Las Vegas, Mr. Weber personally told a story of an epiphany this ex-Californian/current Charlestonian experienced while driving on Pacific Coast Highway visiting back home on a summer break three years ago.

As he recounts to this scriber and to Charleston City Paper's Ms. Winterfeldt, driving, he pondered about the sunny, warm California climate and lifestyle and the sunny, warm South Carolina climate and lifestyle, which they have in common; and the distinctiveness between the two regions, California's image of trendiness and inventiveness and the South's respect of history and love of culture. Put them together, what comes out is Americana.

Knowing he is one of many recent emigrants into the South, bumping the upsurge in demographic and populace into millions, Cary knows there is a sizeable population of fashionistas living in the South seeking something comfortable and stylish to wear everyday, especially when the weather turns sweaty and wet during the Summer. More than ever during the Summer, they want to something that is just as hot, sultry, and sexy as the weather. This is where Sucker Jeans was conceived.

"The South is 100 million people, yet there are no brands saying, "We're inspired by the South."

Mystified why there was no brand targeting the modern, contemporary actual South, Cary figured it was up to him to do it. Having lived here for close to twenty years, he not only saw changes in the region but witnessed overall changes in American apparel industry years before.

Growing up as a kid in his hometown, Hermosa Beach, California, he saw the inception of Ocean Pacific and Body Glove and his childhood friends, Mossimo's then Modern Amusement's Alan Burdine and Volcom's Thom McElroy buck the Manhattan's dominance in fashion by selling the California lifestyle.

While his buddies marketed the California Dream, the adolescent Cary hit the emerging Downtown Los Angeles garment district for cheap and plentiful New Wave and Punk clothes.

Now as a long-time Charlestonian, he became acquainted with the history and the comfortable feel of seersucker.

Telling Ms. Winterfeldt, he liked the idea of elitist college students taking over a poor man's silk, seersucker, as their version of subversive "reverse snobbery," then transforming it into the cliche cloth of Olde Money and Old South. Cary called this irony, "conservative usurping."

"It's Americana," he states. "There are two American fabrics: denim and seersucker, and the seersucker story is better to me in that it was really the first punk fabric."

As a proud fourth-generation Californian and a new-found Southerner, he wondered...

"Why does the South keep looking to New York or L.A. for their fashion sensibility, when really the 'New South' has its own style?" Weber says. "(Our style) is not as pretentious as New York and not as relaxed as L.A. It's elegant yet casual, edgy without being ridiculous."

Cary's Sucker Jeans arrived at this particular moment in time where it's not only hip but encouraged to say "We're from the South."

Sucker Jeans is one of several denim brands riding Southern heritage and culture. If they represent the modern, affluent South then Justin Timberlake's William Rast showcases Southern laid-backness meets Hollywood hip in Nashville while Rag and Bone pays homage to Kentucky's long-lost textile mills and denim plants.

Trading on Southern heritage is a significant microcosm of the rise of Americana. A yearning for something tangible and authentic, armed with the knowledge it's locally grown and made (better for the environment) and quality in limited amount.

Freedman Clothing's Western Shirts is the West Coast representative of the Southwest, the other side of California Dreaming.

Regardless of which coast a person is on, as long the wheather is sizzling, nothing feels better than a pair of seersucker jeans bouncing from Los Angeles, Las Vegas, and Miami.

Tupelo Mens Bootcut

Armed with a medical degree, Cary also sought to correct the tailoring dilemma common to low-riding jeans, "plumber's crack" when sitting and bending.

His anatomy knowledge makes him better articulated in tailoring an angled, contoured waistband, dipping in front then tilting up in the flat area of the spine where the sacrum, coccyx, and the fleshy round buttocks meet, for a better contour, solving plumber's butt when sitting and squatting.

Monroe Women's Straight Leg

Once the lightbulb went off at that fork in the road, Cary literally drove down that unexpected path and never looked back. He admits there will be bumps in the road ahead in...

He sold his medical practice. Cary and his then girlfriend (now his wife) took a promise of frugality and focused tenacity in starting their company, started from scratch learning textiles in North Carolina, embarked on a trip to Japan to weave that first heavy-weight ten ounces seersucker then convincing Los Angeleno textile manufacturers this can be done then finally returning home to set up Sucker Jeans HQ. All the while proving cynical naysayers wrong.

Macon Womens Flare

On the transition returning home as a new-found Southerner, Cary commented on the garment industry as a whole. Twenty-years ago, New York was the industry standard. Now, it's shifting towards Los Angeles as the industry leader with the South as instigators and innovators.

Sure, it was tough having jaded textile veterans laugh in your face for something so different but the joke is on them.

Sucker Jeans is expanding on it's indigo-rinsed seersucker jeans, building blazers, jackets, and shirts upon them. Cary felt it was wrong using other brands' clothings outfitting his runway show for Charleston Fashion Week. In addition to the women's and mens wear, they're tackling infantwear, just in time for the birth of Cary's son, Van.

With a bustling company and family, Kevin, Vice President of Sales, is one of Cary's right-hand people.

He is the first people to tell you their seersucker is the same weight and durability as traditional denim. The only difference is the weave. The fiber thread is pulled to pucker the seersucker while the denim is twill-weaved on a bias direction., making it close to the body. It is the puckering, not the cotton, that wicks or removes the sweat off the skin for faster evaporation.

Traveling the country, Kevin amusedly cites regional tastes. Here in the Southeast, they prefer the classical straight leg from Alexandria, Virginia to Coconut Grove, Florida. In San Francisco, they are into flashier flare cut. They need something dressier for events, parties, and nightclubs. To meet the demands for eveningwear denim, Cary and company are planning on a creamy Winter White for Fall.

Smiling with bemusement, it will be interesting for Kevin to see what Hollywood wants when he and Cary land there for Los Angeles Market Week. Picking this L.A.-based fashion writer's brain, the first thing to come to mind is the skinny jean to fit into a girl's tall, sexy riding boots with silhouette heels.

Even though Winter White is not available yet, this fashionista is happy to pair her bootcut Sucker Jeans with her summer sandals and strappy heels for this current season of soirees and raves.