1967: Paul Newman introduces the all-denim-inmate look in Cool Hand Luke.
1971: Sonny and Cher assume command of the bell-bottom hip-hugger army.
1976: Farrah Fawcett skates around in Jordache wide-leg blues.
1980: Fifteen-year-old Brooke Shields purrs, “You wanna know what comes between me and my Calvins? Nothing.”Calvin Klein’s revenue shoots up 300 percent in three months.
1985: Rifle Jeans introduces the acid wash; Poison and Whitesnake rock the world with it.
Mid-nineties: Gangsta rappers convince America’s youth to sag.
June 2007: Sagging is outlawed in Delcambre, Louisiana.
August 2008: Katie Holmes’s relaxed-fit, pegged denim prompts the “boyfriend jean” craze.
Spring 2009: Topshop gives us “jeggings.”
July 2009: President Obama defends his “dad jeans” “For those of you who want your president to look great in his tight jeans, I’m sorry—I’m not the guy.”
Summer 2010: Beyonce and Rihanna lend credence to “jorts.”
January 20, 2011: “The Master of the Blue Jeans” opens at the UES’s Didier Aaron Gallery, featuring seventeenth-century paintings of peasants in Genovese denim. “Ren Faire jeans,” anyone?