Cold water, shade, and time

Cold hand wash. Dry flat, in shade. Do not bleach. Repairs: Lagos atelier. That is the whole label, and each line is there for a reason specific to denim that has already lived a life.

Cold, because the indigo in rescued denim has already been through a decade of washing and has very little left to give. Warm water takes it. Hand wash, because the seams we did not sew — the original ones we cut around and kept — are as old as the jean, and a drum does to them in ten minutes what a person would not do in a year.

Shade, because direct Lagos sun will lift the colour out of a wet panel unevenly, and unlike the fade the denim arrived with, that kind is flat and reads as damage. Flat rather than hung, because wet denim is heavy and will pull itself out of shape at the shoulder or the handle.

The last line is the one that matters most. Bring the piece back and we will repair it — restitch a seam, replace a drawcord, patch a wear-through — for as long as we are here. We can't make you another one, so we would rather keep the one you have working.