接上篇: The work elsewhere is more labor-intensive. Here, workers apply discoloring chemicals with brushes; there, they use hand-held guns to blast jets of quartz sand. Assembly line workers hold the edges and cuffs of jeans to spinning abrasive pegs that wear them down or make holes in them. Some apply embroidered designs, others rhinestones, still others stitch patches over holes they have just cut. Even though most of the jeans look thoroughly ruined by the time they leave his factory, Mr. Petrin says: 戦f they ruin a pair, they pay for them. While the American market for high-end jeans represents only about 3 to 4 percent of the total market, it is growing at 40 to 50 percent annually, according to Mark Massura, a strategic planner at Cotton Incorporated, a trade group. It旧 a small part, but it旧 the fastest-growing part of the market,?he said. Part of the market旧 dynamism comes from a constant exchange between Europe and Los Angeles, where, paradoxically, many of the leading entrepreneurs are Italian or French. Adriano Goldschmied, a pioneer in the premium jeans field who started Diesel, Replay and now AG jeans, has moved to California from Italy. Some, like the Frenchman Paul Guez, who started Sasson, have been in the United States for decades; others, like J廨獽e Dahan, who started Seven Jeans, are more recent arrivals from France. The British designer John Galliano, of Dior, pioneered the use of denim in apparel like ball gowns, said Kathryn Gordy Novakovic, a trend analyst at Cotton Incorporated. Brands like Diesel, she said, 滞ave always been pioneers. At a time when everybody was spending $30 for a pair of jeans, Diesel was selling for $98, she said. With the explosion of brands, well over 300 by one estimate, has come also a proliferation of jeans boutiques in America, like Atrium, which has a store on lower Broadway, or Metropark, which started in California in 2004 and hopes to have 25 boutiques nationwide by the end of this year. And new marketing approaches for premium jeans, which sell for $60 and up, as well as elite jeans, which go for more than $130, are also proliferating: limited editions; and accompanying accessories, like a Levi旧 model with a built-in iPod docking station that retails for about $200. Levi旧 is introducing that approach in Europe before bringing it to the United States. One threat to jeans bashers like Mr. Petrin is, of course, a recent fashion trend toward cleaner jeans. 巣hile I still think that abrasions, washing out and other details are relevant, said Deirdre Maloney, an owner of Brand Pimps and Media Whores, a fashion consulting firm in New York, by e-mail. 錊"I think holes and rips will be on hiatus from the market for a couple of seasons." Mr. Petrin is not fazed. He shows visitors Martelli旧 collection of jeans, some from the late 1800旧, some acquired over the years from Japanese collectors noted for scouring the United States in search of antique jeans. Some of those in Mr. Petrin旧 collection have sold for as much as $38,000, and look as if they渇 been through the Gold Rush twice. In another factory, a quarter-hour drive from the largest, nearly 200 workers busily brush, poke, slather with chemicals and generally mishandle jeans. Even a hole has to be made properly. 荘he size, the shape and location have to be right, Mr. Petrin said. Hand-processing, which can take six hours or more, drives up production costs to almost $100 a pair. Remember that when you see the retail price of premium jeans, he said. --

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