Design + Inspiration

Einstoffen

20th March 2020

A pledge to show support of independent retailers in the COVID-19 crisis with donation from online sunglass sales

Young Swiss eyewear label Einstoffen is taking immediate action in light of the global health crisis by donating a percentage of their online sunglasses sales back to their long-term optical partners.

Philippe Rieder told Eyestylist: “We have decided to support our customers in these difficult times as much as our strengths allow. From 18th March to 19th April 2020, 50% of the turnover of each pair of sunglasses purchased online will be credited to the opticians in the town where the purchase has been made.”

“We do not want to benefit at the expense of our partners. Our corrective frames will continue to be available only in specialist shops but we hope that this percentage of our online sunglasses sales could at least help alleviate our customers’ losses in some way…”

This spring, the brand has launched its biggest collection yet: ‘Stand Tall, Run Free’ with 40 new styles in titanium, wood acetate and steel. It celebrates independent minds and free spirits with forward-thinking designs, unusual materials and material combinations, with a focus on easy-to-wear design with the occasional ‘surprising twist’.

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‘Stand Tall, Run Free’ stays true to the signature Einstoffen style, mixing natural resources with technical materials and easy-fitting shapes. New eye-catching details include very detailed micro-engravings, sprayed titanium, lenses in multiple colours and tiny wooden inserts. Find out more about the collection at www.einstoffen.ch

EINSTOFFEN is a young eyewear and fashion brand founded in 2008 by four friends from Switzerland. Inspired by nature, art, film and music, the brand has since created shirts, glasses, sunglasses, T-shirts and watches for cosmopolitan individualists with a sense of humour. “In our eyes, eyewear and streetwear, nature and urbanity, Swiss quality awareness and a pinch of extravagance go together very well.”

Design + Inspiration

Sustainable eyewear – neubau + natural3D

16th March 2020

The eco choices in eyewear continue to widen and neubau eyewear from Austria – one of the young innovative companies focusing on eco-friendly design, has just added to its selection of materials with their own new 100% bio-based ‘natural3D’. A special edition sunglasses collection has been released to show off the fresh relaxed styling and fresh Spring-infused colours available, with 3 models – Romy (above on model), Maurice and Alain.

Oversized and glamorous in new eco-friendly material: model Romy by neubau

What is ‘natural3D’? The all-new material, natural3D by neubau eyewear, is created via an innovative and sustainable production process. The surface is skin-friendly with smooth sealed edges and vibrant colour intensity which will not fade. The material is formed using the oil extracted from the castor oil plant’s seeds. The resulting powder derived during this extraction is merged together layer by layer by a laser during 3D printing and any excess material is then reused for additional frames (ensuring zero waste).

Laid-back chic styling: model Greta from neubau eyewear, one of four new optical styles

neubau eyewear has also launched four new optical styles in the new eco-friendly material, available from April 2020. The frames are named after environmental activists. For mode details visit www.neubau-eyewear.com

Design + Inspiration

Art works: l.a. eyeworks, California

11th March 2020

‘The lens cleaning cloth re-imagined as a canvas for creative action’

l.a. Eyeworks – whose long-term commitment to the art world has evolved through many years via an exciting legacy of collaborations with visual innovators – artists, illustrators, graphic designers and photographers – has a fresh line-up of art inspiration coming our way shortly. The brand has commissioned Los Angeles-based artists Liz Young and Julian Hoeber, and designer Gere Kavanaugh, an AIGA Medalist to create new designs for their cleaning cloths accompanying all their Spring 2020 eyewear and sunglass styles.

Above: the design by Gere Kavanaugh, a prolific voice in the history of American design, Gere Kavanaugh’s pioneering spirit and talents have touched almost every aspect of the discipline. A unifying thread throughout Kavanaugh’s work is the designer’s passion for colour (“I could eat colour”), bountifully represented in this explosive, fractal composition.

Julian Hoeber – ‘sampler of eyes’ design

Julian Hoeber’s artwork for the iconic eyewear label explores the mysterious territory between oppositions – organic and inorganic, conceptual and experiential – as a way to illustrate the workings of the human mind. Hoeber’s sampler of eyes is described as “representing a journey from a literal self-portrait along a path of historical and pop culture references to an almost complete (and yet recognizable) abstraction”.

Working in diverse media, often with labor-intensive methods, artist Liz Young focuses on themes that evoke the beauty, fragility, and inevitable decay of nature and the human body. Perhaps metaphorically referencing the American West, Young’s photograph of a horse’s eye captures a moment of stillness, a poetic pause between vitality and decline. Find out more about l.a. Eyeworks at www.laeyeworks.com

Design + Inspiration

SALT. Optics – into Spring/Summer

9th March 2020

The natural landscapes of California and the colours and textures of endorheic basins of the world have inspired a new mood and colour palette in the C1-20 collection of eyewear.

Inspired by effortless beauty, and the natural formations and colours of endorheic basins – the characteristic of which is usually a saline lake or salt flats, the new releases at SALT. bring together two key characteristics, stylish design with a high-class, lasting finish. The collection, which includes new optical and sunglass shapes, is made in Japan, where producers create the frames according to time-old traditions.

Above: the Hillier sunglasses by SALT. Optics are named after the lake in Middle Island, Archipelago of the Recherche, Western Australia – a classically chic oval shape fitted with polarized CR39 gradient lens – available at https://saltoptics.com/products/hillier-tt

Hillier Sun – available in black, taupe, antique rose and toasted toffee

The smallest details, right down to the pins visible at either side of the front of the frames are distinctive in their quality and finish set flush into the surface of the acetate. Alongside classic tones of black and indigo blue, hues inspired by the colorations of salt flats and lakes include taupe, smoke grey, whiskey and woodgrain.

Fuller 50 in black and Fuller 48 in taupe – Collection 1 2020

Model Fuller – available in tones which include black, smoke grey, tortoise grey and woodgrain – is one of the classic 1960s infused shapes in the collection, created in multiple sizes for a wide variety of faces. The thin clean lines of the silhouette – which has a delicate key hole bridge – define the signature timeless aesthetic of SALT. VIew model Fuller at: https://saltoptics.com/products/fuller-50-rx-tg

SALT. Optics optical and sunglass collections are designed in California and made in Japan. The models in Collection 1 2020 are available through selected optical retailers and online at www.saltoptics.com. CN

Design + Inspiration

Exclusive collection: EOE 10th Anniversary

6th March 2020

Collection 2020: re-edition of ‘favourite styles’ with elegant contemporary finish – a celebration of the sustainable label’s 10th Anniversary

One of eyewear’s innovative ‘treasures’, creative, pioneering, and committed to excellence in design, EOE Eyewear is celebrating 10 years in the optics business with inspirations in art and beautiful, wearable signature eyewear collectibles. Among the re-edition frames, each one updated with special nuances and nature inspired hues, are models Burträsk and Abisko – created in two special editions.
The EOE Eyewear brand started in 2010 when Erik and Emilia Lindmark were taking a snowmobile ride outside the small village of Ammarnas in northern Sweden. The white and softly rolling landscape gave birth to the idea of an eyewear brand that would combine inspiration from the barren nature of Lapland with the fastidious elegance so significant for Scandinavian design.
To mark the special Anniversary, EOE Eyewear has also been developing a special artistic collaboration. Finnish artist, Linda Linko has worked to translate some of the most evocative places and materials of their homeland which have inspired the EOE co-founders Erik and Emilia Lindmark throughout their first 10 years. Her work (above) will appear in packaging and cleaning cloths in 2020.

Burträsk is the cool cateye of the EOE Eyewear “family.” Inspired by Emilia’s grandpa, this dramatic feminine statement frame is now reissued in a new material, made entirely from waste products from inside the EOE Eyewear factory.

The light modified cat’s eye shape of the second Burträsk edition is a wonderfully creative interpretation of this dramatic shape, with a lightness achieved through the open sections above the lenses and the narrow semi-rimless structure of the smooth metal which frames the top rim.

Model Abisko is named after a village located north of the Arctic Circle, a place known for spectacular views of the aurora borealis. The newly updated aviator shape has a very fine chic profile and highlights the U-shape of the Lapponian Gate, a striking element of the local landscape. Produced in a wonderful trendy green tinted titanium, the new edition also has a graduated tinted lens, inspired by the colours of the Northern Lights.

Meanwhile the Abisko Round takes the concept further in an oval eye shape with a uniquely feminine yet minimal design. Inspiration for the subtle delicacy of the light pink-purple lens tone comes from the early morning hues of Lapland’s crisp winter skies.

“All of our frames are sustainably produced and fully recyclable and bio-degradable. EOE of today is considered a pioneer in sustainability. In 2019, we broke new ground when launching REGRIND, a concept which made us the first player in the global eyewear industry to produce new frames made from old ones.” – Emilia Lindmark, EOE Eyewear

For more information visit www.eoe-eyewear.com