Tools of the Trade: Several years back I was at the JLC Live show and noticed an exhibitor selling Scandinavian-designed work pants that had built-in sleeves for holding kneepads, waist-level nail pouches, and all kinds of specialized pockets. I bought a couple of pairs and before long I stopped wearing my old work pants. Those first pairs were from Blåkläder, but I have since switched to a brand called Björnkläder.
8 comments:
It sounds almost like IKEA made a pair of pants, however they would probably be spelled pännts. Personally I havent had to wear over-engineered cargo pants, or a tool belt that much of the time, as most of the work I have done is in a shop where I could leave everything that I need on a table within my arms length. However I could see that not leaving any of your tools in a place where they could walk off would be a good thing.
The article mentioned that he has yet to put a hole in them after years of work. However, they do seem on the expensive side for a pair of pants that would be at high risk for getting destroyed.
I find cargo/carpenter pants so useful when building, as womens' jeans often do not have any pocket space at all and I often end up leaving my valuables elsewhere on a job site, which makes me feel slightly uneasy. And womens' jeans also call for a belt if you want any support for holding a drill or any other kind of tool at your hip. While these pants seem super useful and reliable, they do have a ton of features and that does seem a little excessive. Especially since the author himself claims to have cut off unnecessary loops.
I took a bit of a deeper look into the website for this product and I do agree with Kim that there seems to be a lot of excessive features to this. one of their cheaper pair has more of a sleek design to it. still a good amount of pockets and such for tools. I have seen these pants around and I have to say I am a decent fan of them but for the price of them I would rather buy some BDU's from uniform supplies (or army surplus stores because I can usually get a discount) and buy a decent tool belt. Ive seen other versions of these pants that also have a slot for knee pad inserts at the knee. the other nice feature to these pants is that the tool pockets at the hip will pivot and swing as you bend over and work around in various positions like a tool belt.
These pants seem like they would be incredibly useful on calls and would make shop work or any calls were you need a lot of tools less of a hassle. I agree with Kim that women's pants have very little pocket space or support to keep a lot in your pockets and that has caused me to struggle a little with tool storage on my person. I will probably not go out and buy these because for me I am not on calls like this often enough to warrant a new pair pants. I would however tell a friend who is looking for pants to consider these.
This is really intriguing to me, since all I wear are work pants. I have found a traditional carpenter pants from Wrangler that I love. They are very simple and have the tall skinny pocket on the right and a hammer loop on the left, which I would not mind cutting off. These new pants are crazy with the amount of pockets and accessories. I am most definitely the type who finds something he likes and does not sway from it. So it would be a large commit for me to spend a $100 (roughly) on a pair of pants. The knee pads are the major bonus but currently do not do a lot of work on my knees. So depending on where my career leads me and the amount of work I do in an office vs. on the floor is yet to be seen. Only the future knows what will happen.
Having worked in Europe I know that this style of work pants is incredible popular. I own a pair of similar pants and they were all I wore when I was working. Mine don't actually have knee pads but do have pockets to put some in if I wanted to. The extra pockets and flaps are super useful. I don't particularly like wearing a tool belt so having everything I need directly on my hip in a build in pocket is much nicer. The obvious downsides are the price and how difficult they are to get. I can also see how the extra pockets and flaps might be a bit much in some situations. I wish this style was more widely accepted and used in the US because they are obviously very different and I feel a bit silly being the only one wearing something like this on a job site.
These pants certainly aren’t new, and have been on the market for quite some time now, although like the author said, they aren’t or haven’t been readily available in the US. With that though Caterpillar released a very similar product about a year or two ago now. The product you’d be looking for is the Renegade Trouser or Trademark Trouser (http://www.catapparel.com/_workwear/bottoms.html). The price-point is a bit more reasonable and they’re much easier to find stateside. I know a handful of people that started wearing the Caterpillar product after it came out and they’ve had nothing but good this to say about them. Another company with a quality work pant is the Duluth Trading Company, they also have a variety of shirts to select from (causal, flannel, and of the t-shirt variety), and believe it or not a working man’s suit jacket.
I can see these pants being extremely useful especially since, repeating what Kim and Olivia said, women's jeans have ridiculously small pockets. As many people know, I've resorted to using my boots as extra pockets. I have been thinking about investing in a pair of cargo pants for that exact reason but these pants seem to have a few more accessories than needed. (Especially since I don't know how necessary these pants will be to me after I graduate and go into the costume/fashion world... but you know, maybe they will be the smartest purchases I will ever make...) I don't think you should invest so much money into something if you're going to just cut off some of the features. I will say that the knee pads is a genius idea and though I've probably heard of it, it's never really crossed my mind. I wonder how good the mobility is. Because I'm pretty small and I tend to climb and move a lot, it would be extremely useful if you can move in the pants. For example, jeans can sometimes constrict movement a lot and so climbing tends to be fun, but a total pain in the a**. And because Joe just posted about Duluth, I was looking at their pants and they have gussets which is awesome because it sucks when you have to crouch or something and all of a sudden you hear a rip and there's nothing you can do but deal with it because you're on call. Work pants should have gussets!!!!
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