Life was hard in Montfroc. Boring, actually. Boring someone's pants off was more popular than "jeu de boules", and that says a lot in France. Tired of boring pants off, Jean decided to go to Nîmes, and to become an apprentice in the cloth industry. There he learned how to weave and dye the sturdy kind of cloth Nîmes was famous for. It was used mainly for sailors' trousers and kit bags, but he thought of it as a possible new Paris fashion. Once his diplome of "Maître Couturier ès Trucs Bleu Marin", meaning "This person can make sailors' trousers as well as anybody else", in the revolver pocket of his sailors' trousers, he headed for Paris, the cultural capital of Europe back then.