Would you pay for custom jeans?

Would you pay $1,200 for these jeans?

You can pick your own zipper and rivets, choose from 130 fabrics — and even get your kid’s drawing on the back pockets

Tony Parker wanted his name stitched into the waistband. A former Stanford women’s volleyball player was desperate for a pair of pants with a 38-inch inseam. And a New York father got a picture of an alligator, sketched by his 6-year-old daughter, sewn onto the back pockets.

The cost of each pair of jeans? $1,200 to $1,500.

To achieve their denim dreams, all three customers went to 3×1 in SoHo — a 7,000- square-foot, three-story retail store-cum-denim factory turning out bespoke jeans that can cost more than someone’s monthly rent.

While Uniqlo hawks $9.99 Japanese denim pants, 3×1 is tapping into the seemingly passé high-end jeans market with a vengeance — recession be damned.

“I never know if there’s a right time, but I think the market has kind of reached the point where to just launch another jeans line doesn’t matter,” says 3×1 owner Scott Morrison when questioned about the economic appropriateness of his latest venture.

“For a long time, I’ve been wanting to make a really small quantity of a really special product for people who are looking for something that is not everywhere,” adds Morrison, who previously launched Paper Denim & Cloth and Earnest Sewn — two denim companies that made $200 pairs of flares de rigueur in the early aughts (prior to that, the norm was set by Diesel and Earl Jean’s $99 pants).

Ever since 3×1 opened in June, customers such as basketball players Parker and Steve Nash, fashion photographer Gilles Bensimon and urban wit Fran Lebowitz have been tossing out their generic Levi’s for some of the most exclusive jeans on the block.

While all of 3×1’s jeans reek of prestige, not all of the store’s pants are created equal.

First up are the limited-edition jeans, made in batches of only eight, 16 or 24. Jeans lovers can get on-the-spot hemming and select rivets and buttons. Prices run from $295 to $475.

Natalie Kates, 42, snagged a pair of limited-edition skinny jeans for a handful of Benjamins. She chose an orange button and thread because, as she explains, “I’m Buddhist. It is our color of enlightenment.”

Limited edition not enlightened enough for you? Try a pair of custom jeans.

“You find a style/fit you want, and you can pair it or marry it to any of the fabrics we have,” explains Morrison. (3×1 has nearly 130 fabrics to choose from.) Prices start at $525 and go up to $750.

Still too generic?

Customers can create an entirely new pair of pants from scratch. Starting price? Oh, a mere $1,200. The steep cost hasn’t stopped 3×1 from gaining a loyal following.
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