To celebrate our 20th anniversary, we curated an exhibition on the history of eyewear. This is the on-line version of the exhibition. The Spectacle 20/20 exhibition showcases ‘the classics’ in eyewear design. These styles, famous for their timeless appeal, are inspired by fashion trends throughout history. This exhibition examines these enduring styles and the people that make them classic.
Shades Optical curating the modern classics for 20 years
The Classic Aviator is a universal favorite. Aviators get their name from the teardrop shape, which matched the flying goggles of the Army and Navy in the early part of the 20th century. The design typically covers the entire eye and prevents as much light as possible from entering the eye socket.
The idea for the aviator was born in 1920 after a lieutenant returned from a balloon adventure complaining that the sun had done permanent damage to his eyes. In 1937, at the request of the balloonist, Bausch & Lomb created the first prototype. Pilots in the Air Force immediately adopted Aviators as a way to protect their eyes from the high-altitude glare of the sun.
The worldwide familiarity of the style came when General Douglas MacArthur landed on the beach in the Philippines during World War II and snapshots were taken of him wearing his Aviators.
While still popular with military, law enforcement and aviators alike, the sunglasses grew as a fashion icon in the 1970s and 1980s and continue to be a favorite today.
The top fashion designers of the 20th century always rounded out their collections with eyewear and accessories. Yves St. Laurent, Christian Dior and Coco Chanel designed classic styles that epitomized a certain kind of seductive and intelligent wearer. Think Brigitte Bardot.
Re-igniting popular styles from the 1960s, the frames have a retro feel while being contemporary. Each unique pair reveals a timeless quality that is still as desirable today as it was 40 years ago. Women and men who are deeply conscious of elegant style and individuality look to updated fashion icons of the 20th century.
Original, creative, vibrant and brash. Sixties fashion belonged to London, where trendy Brits set the stage and the world followed. As is still the case, musical taste and fashion were closely linked, and it was the “mod” look that first popularized the simple, geometric, and abstract shapes typical of the era.
The 1960s was also a time when people began to regard eyewear as serious fashion; a key accessory to any outfit. The classic mod eyeglass designs of the period simply radiated sexy cool. Many designs created back then still appear fresh today. Surviving examples of 1960s designer frames are highly sought after by collectors.
Audrey Hepburn, Grace Kelly, Michael Caine and Sophia Loren all wore mod styles, but it was Jacqueline Kennedy who truly popularized mod designer eyeglasses in America. Some of the frames Jackie O wore covered half her face.
Mod is short for modern, which as the period of design history, is almost always associated with minimalism. While there is nothing very minimal about most mod fashion, its roots come from modern design. Reinvented for the 21st century, the Classic Mod style has proven equally popular with today’s most fashionable and is being worn by current trendsetters.
The Classic Dylan, also known as the wayfarer, is often cited as the best-selling design in sunglass history. It has been called one of the most enduring fashion icons of the 20th century.
In 1952 an inventor for Bausch and Lomb designed the wayfarer. The design was a radically new shape, "a mid-century classic to rival Eames chairs and Cadillac tail fins" according to design critic Stephen Bayley. The design took advantage of new plastics technology, marking the transition from a period of eyewear with thin metal frames to an era of plastic eyewear. Wayfarers experienced early popularity in the 1950s and 1960s, especially after Audrey Hepburn wore a pair in the 1961 movie Breakfast at Tiffany's.
Like Aviators, these glasses were originally marketed as sunglasses for pilots. During the 1950s and 1960s, celebrities including Bob Dylan, James Dean, John F. Kennedy, Roy Orbison, and Andy Warhol were known for wearing wayfarers.
Around the same time, they rapidly rose in popularity among Hollywood starlets such as Marilyn Monroe.
By the 1970s the style’s popularity had declined dramatically. It was again in the early 1980s that wayfarers experienced a great comeback. Tom Cruise immortalized them in Risky Business, and Dan Akroyd and John Belushi utterly defined “cool” wearing wayfarers in The Blue Brothers.
The Innovator. The personality that is about exploring new terrain, looking at things in a new way and enhancing the world around us with new ideas. Innovators throughout time have led great change, created truly authentic events, and introduced nuance to the world.
The introduction of new materials and cutting-edge production techniques are allowing designers to break with convention. Titanium, carved plastics, molded synthetics, exotic woods, stamped metal, laser etching and custom lamination are just some of the advancements that have led to the most innovative designs on the optical market today.
Inspired by the automotive design process, groundbreaking product design, and extreme sports gear, the eyewear industry is witnessing a shift toward the future with these unique and advanced finely engineered frames. These artistic designs are often minimal yet exquisitely detailed. Their sophistication comes from the beauty and sheer elegance of simplicity.
Radically new, innovative and rebellious; to be revolutionary is to inspire change. Some of the most famed revolutionaries in politics, art, and music of the past century wore these iconic frames.
Infamous for the unique brow line style. These frames were very popular during the 1950s, especially in America. The name is derived from the bold upper part of the glasses, which frame the lenses in the same way that a person’s eyebrows frame the eyes. Malcolm X is famous for popularizing the brow line frames.
Philosophers, artists, actors, writers, musicians and inventors have all have been drawn to the classic round shape of this time-tested favorite. The classic spectacle, also referred to as Windsor style, was introduced around 1880 and remained very popular until after the First World War.
The round lenses, the smooth fixed bridge in place of nose pads, and temples that loop behind the ear are the distinguishing feature. It was the loop behind the ear that was a key innovation in eyeglass design. Generally, spectacles made before 1880 would not stay in place while riding a horse, running, or doing any type of manual work. Windsors traditionally came in silver, roman steel, gold filled, white gold filled and nickel.
Many of the newest styles are thick plastic spectacles to create a fun, fresh twist on the age-old classic.
In the Arctic, the sun shines low on the horizon twenty-four hours a day for nearly 190 days during the summer. Snow blindness occurs when the sunlight reflecting off the surface of the snow combines with the light angled directly into the eyes to burn the retina. For the Inuit, snow blindness hindered hunting, travel, and trade. The painful condition could last for days. Ouch! Into the original classic sport.
According to the Canada’s National History Society, the Inuit constructed eyewear from caribou antlers, bone, leather or wood. Carved to fit the natural curve of the face, with a divot for the bridge of the nose and two slits for the eyes, it was held in place with sinew, the first snow goggles date back to the Thule Inuit, two thousand years ago. The slits allowed them to see, but blocked enough light to prevent snow blindness. As technology advanced, this Inuit design gradually evolved into the sunglasses and protective eyewear of today.
Today proper sports glasses can have a profound effect on an athlete's overall performance. They are lightweight, polarized and designed to protect the eyes from harmful UV rays. Athletes wearing protective eyewear with polycarbonate or impact-resistant lenses are spared injury, as standard lenses could shatter.
Throughout time creative individuals have been notorious for their eclectic eyewear. Elton John, Andy Warhol, Bono, Madonna – these folks are neither shy nor ordinary. When it comes to the creative style, it’s not only about the look of the frames, it’s about how one wears them.
The Classic Creative is a frame that is designed to express ones individual spirit. It can be playful, bright, whimsical, and is uniquely crafted. This is eyewear designed to make a statement on the face of those who dare to wear. Often bold and unpredictable, these styles exemplify freshness, imagination and individualism.
Poodle skirts, bobbie socks and saddle shoes. Put on your Classic Cat Eyes, tie a scarf around your hair, hop in your convertible T-Bird and head for the drive-in. Nothing says 1950s cool quite like the retro cat eye frame.
Crisscrossing the line between librarian-sexy and roller-derby-girl-hot, the Classic Cat Eye is style that sexy secretaries in old movies would remove at the perfect moment, causing the boss to say, ''My God, you're beautiful!” These glasses have once and for all shed their nerd status and are the epitome of understated apparel.
Often encrusted with rhinestones or other jewels in the pointed corners, these details add the perfect touch of sparkle to your look.
Pop singer Lisa Loeb has made cat eye glasses a big part of her signature look, and she is often credited with the modern comeback of these stylish 1950s frames.
