Mykita, VAVA, Christian Roth and Thom Browne — some of the savviest eyewear manufacturers — gather to perfect your style. Tap into their brand philosophies and chose your favourite sunglasses style this autumn. Available at ENTRANCE.
MYKITA X Martine Rose
For this season, the German optical manufacturer Mykita has collaborated with London-based men’s wear designer Martine Rose to introduce an eyewear line inspired by ’90’s dance and club culture. The joint collection revolves around KITT, a playful frame that Mykita bills as a design that “does not want to be serious”. Enjoy the boldly colourful frames in Royal Blue, Antique Red, Black and New Lime.
WHO IS MYKITA?
Founded in Berlin, in 2003 by four friends with a background in industrial design and a taste for adventure, Mykita quickly set out to produce some of the most interesting eyewear designs available on the market, using techniques and materials that had never been used before, creating its own tools of production and expanding its business in a completely independent manner. Another key to Mykita’s success in building its luxury positioning has been working with established designers, although its fashion popularity came almost by accident, when a pair of Mykita sunglasses was worn by Sarah Jessica Parker in one of the most commercial fashion movies of our time: Sex and the City 2. As such, in a luxury eyewear world still dominated by a few monopolists, Mykita has established itself on the fashion map through a number of distinctive, quite unique features. First of all, its feather-light, exceptionally bendable and almost unbreakable frames — hand crafted from stainless steel, acetate and Mylon, the brand’s proprietary polyamide based material. Second, its bold and independent business strategy — everything, from design to production and communication is done in-house or through tightly controlled partnerships. And finally, its numerous designer collaborations, with the likes of Damir Doma, Bernhard Willhelm, Maison Martin Margiela and Ambush, to name just a few.
VAVA Red Label
Designed by Portuguese architect Alvaro Siza Vieira, the sporty Red Label eyewear collection from VAVA stays true to the brand’s artistic values and philosophic standards. It also makes a more “mundane” offer to its clients: sunglasses sets with interchangeable frames and lenses with colours ranging from black to orange, blue and red.
WHO IS VAVA?
What do Detroit and Berlin — with their consistent techno scenes and their post-industrial landscapes — have in common with the Italian futurism, SF movies, Sol Lewitt’s cube and the squared aesthetics of the first personal computers designed in the ‘80s? They are all part of a melting point which is the inspiration behind every single design ever produced by VAVA, an eyewear manufacturer with a strong conceptual identity. Established in 2003, by Portuguese designer Pedro Passos da Silva in Berlin, and created in collaboration with Giordano Cazzola and Beate Leinz (formerly, an eyewear designer for Prada), VAVA’s aim was to become a wearable philosophy, a label that includes both the highly conceptual language of machinery in a post-human future and the emotional approach of the arts. This fusion has resulted in sophisticated, contemporary designs with geometric shapes and an almost exclusive use of the two conceptual opposites: back and white. But the focus is also on high quality and sustainability, as all products are hand crafted in a small family-run Italian factory and the frames are made in eco-friendly and 100% recyclable acetate. VAVA’s mission? Representing an individual in control of the technological world and re-imagining the future. One pair of glasses at the time.
CHRISTIAN ROTH’s Kardo
This autumn, the American brand taps into the twilight years of punk with Kardo, a rebellious cat eye frame apparently inspired by the spirit of the Basilica di San Marco in Venice. All in all, expect shimmering metallic lenses encased within a gold, chrome or crystal clear acetate frame, using Christian Roth’s signature lens-in-lens technology.
WHO IS CHRISTIAN ROTH?
German eyewear designer Christian Roth met Eric Domège in New York City in 1983, where they were both working in optical, fashion photography and marketing. In 1984 the duo founded Optical Affairs in New York and created the Christian Roth Eyewear brand. Christian Roth sunglasses first appeared on the runway in 1985 and soon the designers were asked to create custom frames for the fashion shows of industry heavyweights and served on the eyewear design teams as well. Throughout the eighties and nineties, the publicly acclaimed successes of the brand earned Christian Roth an invitation to join the Council of Fashion Designers of America, in 1990 – the first time an eyewear designer was ever selected by the CFDA. Over the following years, the Christian Roth brand collaborated on custom runway eyewear with numerous fashion houses such as Helmut Lang, Isaac Mizrahi, Karl Lagerfeld, Marc Jacobs, Michael Kors and Rifat Ozbek, and expanded its business worldwide. Nowadays Christian Roth takes pride in being able to deconstruct and reinvent its vintage fashion legacy so as to remain relevant to a new generation of costumers, who rejects racial, gender and class labels that once confined designers and labels.
THOM BROWNE’s round frames
Each Thome Browne piece is marked with the brand’s signature red, white and blue logo tip and four stripe hinge — and this pair makes no exception. With unbreakable titanium frames (100%) and gold plated details, these round shades provide lightness, strength and comfort, and tap into this season’s eyewear’s trends.
WHO IS THOM BROWNE?
With his eye for style and obsessive attention to details — and, surprisingly, with no formal fashion design training (he did, however, moved to New York in 1997 to work as a salesman in Giorgio Armani’s showroom) — Thom Brwone has been upgrading the fashion scene since 2003. He started with a flagship store and expanded worldwide in just a of couple of years, which says a lot about his passion for fashion and his perseverance. More than that, Thom Browne has created an eyewear line that is particularly iconic, stylish and sophisticated — and completely recognisable as his own. His pieces are timeless and unique, combining eyewear designs from the past with the hippest fashion trends nowadays. Classic square frames come in perfect harmony with metal blinkers and side shields, creating a style that’s hip and relevant throughout decades of fashion. This is probably why Thom Browne sunglasses are a popular choice among Hollywood stars such as Pharrell Williams or Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who are fans of Browne’s iconic style. In 2011, he teamed up with the LA-based luxury eyewear designer, DITA, to release unisex sunglasses styles inspired by the master architects, studio artists, industrial designers and professors of the 40s, 50s and 60s. In the few years since he started his line, he’s become a force in advancing global fashion trends, in eyewear, as well as in clothing items.
By Diana Colcer
Photography Christian Tudose
Styling Amir Doboș
All shades available at ENTRANCE
