If someone asked you to define Denim, what exactly would your answer be? I wrestled with this when asked.

DENIM: a sturdy, indigo-dyed cotton fabric available in various weights and qualities that is used to make jeans. Why is it different from other twills. Well, it is woven with a dyed warp yarn and natural fill yarn, resulting in its characteristic wear-down qualities.

Where does the word Denim come from: It is actually an Americanization of the French name "serge de Nimes," a fabric which originated in Nimes, France during the Middle Ages. In 1864, Webster's dictionary listed the shortened English version: DENIM.

Now you know. This is great sewing trivia.

If the yards of denim were laid out, you could create a four-lane denim highway more than 60,000 miles long. Now, that's a lot of denim.

Denim comes in many varieties and most of us don't know each one of these.

Broken Twill-this is a 3X1 weave where the twill rib does not run in a straight diagonal line, but instead it changes direction. Why? This reduces fabric torque.
Carding: This is the process in which the cotton fibers are cleaned.
Cotton fiber: all denim begins with cotton fiber.
Faux Ring-Spun: This makes denim fabric appear to be ring-spun
Filling Yarn: also known as weft yarn
Left-Hand twill: this produces a diagonal line
Open-ended: This open-ended spinning was introduced in the 1970's. This makes the yarn faster and less expensive.
Plain weave: also called one-up-one-down weave
Right-hand twill: this produces a diagonal line that rises from the lower left to the upper right.
Ring/OE: This results in a softer denim.
Ring-Ring: This is when the lengthwise and filling yarns are woven together.
Ring-Spun: The yarns are twisted which makes them stronger
Roving: During the yarn-making the cotton fiber is drafted into smaller and finer form
Selvage: The small woven edge that is parallel to the warp. As we know, this prevents raveling.
Sliver: The cotton fiber that is untwisted, loose and soft.
Slub: A short yarn imperfection.
Staple: Lengths of fiber before they are twisted and spun into yarn
Tear: When pulled, this is a piece of the fabric's horizontal strength.
Tensile: When pulled, a piece of the fabric's vertical strength.
Warp: Yarn that runs lengthwise and parallel to the selvage.
Weight: Denim can be woven into many weights-from four to over 14 ounces.

Denim can be dyed in almost any shade imaginable. We tend to think of it as blue. The next installment of the denim blues will cover how denim is dyed.