Gay levi

The words “I know you know” are embroidered onto it—a phrase LGBTQ+ people used to identify each other before it was safe to be open about their identity. Designs throughout the collection honor efforts by the community to reclaim and redefine symbols that have had different and at times fraught meanings over time but continue to carry profound significance today.

With this collection, Levi’s is working to honor the symbol’s history. “This was the height of the AIDS crisis,” Aleman says.

Pride and Joy

One of the hero pieces in the collection brings all of these symbols together. In partnership with our employee resource groups, we’re also organizing month-long employee volunteer opportunities at the parades and with local community organizations.

LS&Co.

The brand is sponsoring the San Francisco Pride Parade and the Warsaw Pride Parade in Poland, and from June 12 through June 30, visitors in Poland can stop by the Queer Icons exhibit at QueerMuzeum Warszawa to view pieces from the Levi’s® Archives worn by LGBTQ+ icons such as Elton John.

Black denim coordinates include the Levi’s Pride Icon Skirt and the Pride Denim Moto Jacket.

Aleman says one of the most radical ways we can show the LBGTQ+ community support right now is to give them safe spaces. The Trump administration has defunded gender-affirming care for youth, moved trans women into men’s prisons, and denied requests for gender markers on passports. “We thought the triangle was a very courageous symbol of resilience and protest against homophobia, which is something we need in our world right now.”

The brand’s deep dive into historical LGBTQ+ symbols also reflects Levi’s long-standing support for the community.

Many companies—including Anheuser-Busch, Comcast, Citi, PepsiCo, Booz Allen Hamilton, Deloitte, Visa, and Mastercard—have chosen to discontinue sponsorship of Pride celebrations this year. “But by reflecting back on other symbols of resistance, we remember that the fight is not over yet. The Pride 468 Loose Shorts comes in a vintage light wash and has a black and pink tab on the back pocket.

These efforts are designed to honor and uphold decades of solidarity with the LGBTQ+ community and a long-held commitment to equality for all.

Read on to discover how we’re bringing Pride to life this month.

An Homage to History

The 2025 Levi’s® Pride collection centers around the themes of togetherness, safe spaces and resilience, all of which have been fundamental to LGBTQ+ communities over the past half century and beyond.

This year’s Levi’s® Pride collection supports Outright International, a global organization working to advance human rights for LGBTQ+ people around the world, and Dockers® is once again supporting the Stonewall Community Foundation with an annual donation. We still need to carry the torch.”

Paying Homage

To create this collection, the Levi’s designers, led by Aleman, conducted extensive research in the company’s own archives as well as the GLBT Historical Society in San Francisco.

The company has also made grants to The Trevor Project, a nonprofit aiming to drive awareness around LGBTQ+ youth mental health and work to change hearts and minds across the U.S., and to GiveOut, an organization working to further advance human rights in Asia and Europe.

A Western bandana combines Levi’s signature motifs with queer symbols.

It also empowered its LGBTQ+ designers to come up with a Pride Collection that meets the moment.

In the brand’s archives, there are photos of its lesbian and gay employee association marching in a protest for LGBTQ+ rights in the 1980s bearing a “Levi Strauss & Co.” sign. This is how they decided to lean into the triangle rather than the rainbow.

In the early 1970s, you could see many people at protest marches wearing pins and T-shirts featuring the inverted pink triangle, which organizers in the nascent gay liberation movement used to evoke the memory of those who died in Nazi concentration camps, as well as to protest ongoing discrimination.

A denim cap and the Pride One Family Trucker features the phrase “I know you know.” The jacket also boasts a rainbow-themed bandana patchwork design on the back.

They created a handkerchief to pay homage to the “hanky code,” which is how people reflected their sexual orientation and preferences when it was not safe to do so overtly. “Joy is also an act of resistance.”

This post originally appeared at fastcompany.com

Subscribe to get the Fast Company newsletter: http://fastcompany.com/newsletters