Protecting your eyes from the sun while making a style statement, sunglasses are the hottest multi-taskers in your wardrobe right now. Here’s all you need to know to find the perfect pair.
Protecting your eyes from the sun while making a style statement, sunglasses are the hottest multi-taskers in your wardrobe right now. Here’s all you need to know to find the perfect pair.
A thousand years ago, those wanting to protect their eyes from the sun’s rays might have first had to wrestle a walrus to the ground. The first people to wear sunglasses – no, not Hollywood celebs – were the Inuit of the Arctic. To counter the glare of sunlight reflected off snow, they fashioned sun goggles out of materials like walrus ivory, leather and wood.
Today, this early protective gear has evolved to become big business. The global eyewear market is worth US$90 billion (S$124 billion) and is expected to surpass US$140 billion by 2020. Last year, Luxottica, the Italian giant that produces eyewear for 80 per cent of the world’s major labels – including Prada, Giorgio Armani and Burberry – sold 9 billion euros’ worth of sunglasses and frames.
There’s good reason why shades are on the rise. Occupying prime position on one’s face, they are a quick way to make a stylish statement. Plus, they are actually good for your health, helping to protect against eye problems (such as cataracts) linked to prolonged sun exposure. Looking good while doing right by our eyes? Sounds like a win-win situation to us.
ON THE UP
The rise (and rising prices) of designer sunglasses – and why these shades cost four digits.
Gold, platinum and leather – these are some of the materials used in Victoria Beckham’s latest collection of sunnies. After all, coating a pair of oversized aviators with 18K gold is a surefire way to make them stand out in a sea of acetate or metal frames. It also explains why the prices of these sunglasses go up to £780 (S$1,500).
Other fashion labels making distinctively designed eyewear a focal point in itself include Ermenegildo Zegna. Its top- of-the-line Couture collection includes a pair of sunglasses fashioned from unusual materials like Assam teak, buffalo horn and ruthenium. Its price tag: $2,195.
Also in the four-digit price club is the model shown here, by American fashion designer Thom Browne. Created with Los Angeles- based Dita Eyewear, Browne’s eyewear has a cool vintage-meets- sci-fi aesthetic. But of course, it’s more than looks that gives the pair on this page its four-digit price tag.
THE SHAPES OF THINGS
We take a good look at four types of frames.
01. AVIATOR
Like trench coats and tool watches, aviator sunglasses fall into the category of stylish gear that originated in the military. In the 1930s, American company Bausch & Lomb worked with test pilot John Macready to create eyewear to protect against dazzling sunlight 10,000m in the air. Way before Tom Cruise sported Ray-Ban aviators in the 1986 action film Top Gun, American five-star general Douglas MacArthur thrust the style into the spotlight by wearing them during World War II. Today, aviators remain popular, partly because their mix of straight lines and curves flatters most face shapes – and, undoubtedly, also because they make their wearers look just that much cooler.
02. ROUND
Ever so often, round frames come back in style – and right now, the preferred eyewear shape of music icon John Lennon is once again on the radar of the style- conscious. They are not the easiest style to wear, especially for those whose love for food and drink has manifested itself in the form of a somewhat rounded visage. That said, the latest iterations of round frames tend to be slightly modified (the pair here, for instance, has angular sides), which makes them much more forgiving than versions comprising two perfect circles..
03. RECTANGULAR
We’re hard-pressed to think of a celebrity who has had a greater impact on trending styles than Tom Cruise. After Top Gun was released in 1986, sales of Ray-Ban aviators increased by 40 per cent, and they remained a top-seller for years. Just three years prior, the American actor did the same for Ray-Ban’s rectangular Wayfarer shades by wearing them in the teen comedy Risky Business – 360,000 pairs of the style were sold in 1983. Says Collin Teo, a co-founder of eyewear store The Eye Place: “Wayfarer-style frames started coming up again about four years ago, but they’re still popular because they’re a classic.”
04. BROWLINE
The browline frame has a thicker upper portion that helps to balance out narrower foreheads. While the style does not have the wide appeal of, say, aviators, we like its bookish quirkiness. Its fans have been wide-ranging: In the 1950s, browline glasses were a signature of American civil-rights leader Malcolm X. In the mid-‘80s, Bruce Willis donned browline shades in the television series, Moonlighting. The style has also been immortalised in the logo of fast- food chain Kentucky Fried Chicken, thanks to its bespectacled founder Colonel Harland David Sanders.
