I WAS SO OBSESSED WITH LEVIS THAT MY WORK NUMBER WAS 501
BEX SALMON, 55, is a social media content consultant who lives in North london with her husband and two children, aged 17 and 15. She says: MY OBSESSION with jeans began aged 14 when my mum gave me an old pair of vintage Lee Riders. They fitted me beautifully.
After that I coveted the perfect pair of Levi’s 501s, the iconic brand’s original design, but you couldn’t get them in this country with a long enough leg. I had to wait until I went to America aged 19. In a little town near San Francisco I found a thrift shop where I spent hours trying on every pair of second-hand 501s they had. They cost $1.96 each — less than a pound — and I filled my suitcase.
When designer jeans started hitting the rails in the UK, I soon succumbed, despite the eye-watering price tags. My first pair were by U.S. label Seven For All Mankind and cost well over £100.
The most I’ve spent was £315, and since my teens I must have shelled out up to £30,000, buying a pair or two a month.
My obsession was so well known that in the Nineties my boss even gave me the extension number 501 for my desk phone, and now I post photos of all my jeans on Instagram @bexdoesdenim.