How to Distress Jeans: Step-by-Step Guide

You’ve found yourself with a perfectly pristine pair of jeans, and your next order of business is to breathe a little life and personality into them. Distressing jeans is obvi the natural choice. 

“Distressing your jeans can help make them your own,” says Mallorie Dunn, adjunct professor of fashion design at the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT). “Jeans are such a classic staple piece. By distressing your jeans you can personalize them, make them better fit your fashion style, and also upcycle a pair that maybe you would discard otherwise.” (Fraying over a stain? Genius.) 

Fortunately, learning how to distress your jeans is actually pretty easy. Here’s the full rundown. 

A Quick Guide on How to Distress Jeans  

From what you need to tips on getting that perfectly frayed or lived-in look, here’s the best way to distress jeans. 

Step 1: Grab What You Need 

First thing’s first, make sure you’ve got everything you need on hand.

Step 2: Create a Game Plan 

Before anything else, come up with a game plan for how you want your jeans to look. “Do you just want to give a raw hem look? Or do we want to rough up the edges of the pockets, waistband, and trims? Or maybe you want to create some holes throughout the garment,” says Dunn. Knowing what you want to do will help you execute the look more cleanly and prevent mishaps. 

Step 3: Mark Areas You Want to Distress   

With a fabric marking pen or pencil, lightly mark areas you want to distress. “The most popular options are around the knee, by the ankle, or near to pockets, but it’s completely your choice,” says Talia Johnson, senior creative manager at PrettyLittleThing. “Wearing your jeans whilst you do this is important, so you can see exactly where the rips are going to be.” 

Step 4: Distress Where Preferred   

Now you can go in and start distressing your jeans. 

• Light Distressing: “For light distressing on trims and edges, run sandpaper on the pants,” Dunn says. “Make sure to stop every few minutes to see how much is being taken off and gauge if you’d like to continue with more.” 
• Distressed Hems: For hems, Dunn says you can start by using your fabric scissors to cut off the finished edge. (This is also a chance to create a cropped pant, shorts, or just a pair that fits better length-wise.) Once cut, use a combination of your fabric scissors and seam ripper to shred the edges. “Denim is a twill weave, so the threads will start to unravel in a diagonal. Leave fringe hanging as desired,” Dunn says. 
• Larger Holes: “If you’d like to create holes in the middle of the fabric of the garment, you can cut a slit with the scissors, and then use the scissor and stitch ripper to fray the edges,” Dunn instructs. Because of the way jeans are constructed, it’s best to pull out the blue fibers and leave the white ones for that distressed look. 

Step 5: Soften Edges   

Next, take some time to soften and blend some of the distressed areas with sandpaper. “Buff out some of the edges of the holes you’ve cut to soften any sharp lines you may have created,” says Ashely Full, co-founder and stylist at Amour781. “You also can lightly distress other areas of the jeans like the pockets, thighs, or belt loops without putting a hole in it to make everything look more natural.” 

Step 6: Wash Your Jeans 

Full says the final step is to pop your jeans in the washer, then dry as instructed on the label. This fluffs up and softens the distressed areas even more, creating a more cohesive, professional finish. 

Common Mistakes to Avoid 

Like any DIY project, things can go sideways when distressing jeans. Avoid these common pitfalls. 

• Not Having a Game Plan: Having a general idea of where you want the distressed areas and how large you want them can help create the perfect pair. 
• Going Overboard: “The biggest mistake folks could make when distressing their jeans is to do too much too quickly,” Dunn says. “Sometimes when we are up close on our creative projects for too long we can’t see the bigger picture.” Reassess every once in a while, see what you think in the mirror, and move forward accordingly. 
• Being Too Neat: This is your chance to embrace a bit of chaos. Symmetry just isn’t your friend. “Trying to be too neat with your distressing can be an issue,” Johnson says. “The trend mostly consists of an untidy look.”