Eyeglasses & Sunglasses

Megan Fox’s Eyeglasses Cause Major Case of Eyewear Envy. The Good News? You Can Get Her Lafont Karima Frames at Urban Optiques.

Actress Megan Fox is the perfect example in our minds of why people need to think of eyeglasses as an accessory, and not just a medical necessity.

Take the eyeglasses that Fox was spotted in last year: As soon as the photos of Megan in her fab eyeglasses hit the Internet, there was a flurry of searches around what frames she was wearing.

How do we know?

Well, we watch stuff like this.  It’s part of how we track trends in not just eyewear, but also fashion and accessories. This helps us better predict what to carry in the store, as well as recommend to people what’s going to be stylish this season.

In the case of Fox, it didn’t take much more than a quick look to know right away that she was wearing Lafont eyeglasses, one of our flagship brands here at Urban Optiques.

Based in Paris, Lafont is known for its distinctive eyewear designs, which range from artsy and funky, to chic and sophisticated. continue

Put a Some Sizzle in Your Suns with the Badgley Mischka “Steve” Men’s Aviator Sunglass — The Latest Release from Sama and Badgley Mischka!

You’ll remember in late June that a brand new Badgley Mischka sunglass model — the Steve — was spotted on NBA forward Danny Granger at Sama’s West Hollywood boutique.  While the model hadn’t been publicly-released yet, we called up Sama and asked if we could get our hands on two of the Steves for ourselves.

We loved the big, bold frame — especially when coupled with the special edition 24K yellow gold and 18k white gold flash coated lenses from Sama.  The first of the Badgley Mischka Steve sunglasses arrived this week at Urban Optiques and all we can say is “wow.”

Guys, understand that this is not a sunglass for the man who wants to fade into the crowd. Nor is it for the faint of heart.

There is no way that you can put on the Steve and not get noticed.  It’s a very sexy sunglass, made all the sexier by the brilliant genuine 24K gold flash coating on the lenses. We see this working its magic best paired with a fantastic, custom-tailored suit — but Danny Granger shows that you can also pull it off with workout gear (not recommending this, just saying …)

The Badgley Mischka Steve is so new, in fact, that there’s a good chance that whoever buys the first pair will be one of only a handful of lucky men to be first seen in this very cool sunglass.  Will it be you?

Check out the pictures below that we snapped of the Badgley Mischka Steve in the boutique this week.

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The New Modo ECO Eyewear Collection at Urban Optiques Melds Style with Sustainability.  Eyewear Made from 95% Recycled Materials!

Okay, let’s just get this out of the way: If you are over 25 you’ll remember a time when “eco-friendly” and “fashionable” would not be uttered in the same sentence.  While Birkenstocks are great for your feet, I’m pretty certain “stylish” was never a term that applied to them.

But over the past few years, all of that has changed. Designers and retailers have come up with all kinds of creative ways to produce truly stylish eco-friendly and sustainable products from recycled materials.  One of our favorites is the Harvey Tote made from recycled seat belts, which sounds utterly horrible until you actually see it.  Turns out that seatbelts can be actually quite beautiful when weaved together into a purse or handbag.

Or take the new Modo ECO Eyewear Collection that we just added at Urban Optiques: More than 25 eyeglasses and sunglass models made from 95% recycled plastic and stainless steel. Not only are they environmentally-responsible, but they also look amazing.

MODO ECO Eyewear: Certified “Green”

The Modo ECO (Earth Conscious Optics) line is an eyewear collection marked by “firsts.” It’s the first optical and sunglass collection to be made entirely of recycled materials.  It’s also the first-ever consumer brand and eyewear collection to receive an Environmental Claims Validation (ECV) from UL Environment (ULE), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Underwriters Laboratories (UL), a world leader in product evaluation. Getting a Environmental Claims Validation is not an easy process, so it’s quite an achievement for the New York based boutique eyewear maker.

Everything about the new Modo ECO line is about sustainability, right down to the packaging. In addition to using recycled and repurposed materials to create the frames, the collection is packaged in recycled materials and each new pair is accompanied by an easy to use mail-in recycling kit that allows you to donate your unwanted frames to charities that help supply eyeglasses to developing countries.

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Today’s Look Is All About Pairing the Heart of Gold Sunglass by Sama with Cool Whites and Neutrals for a Perfect All-Day-Long Summer Look

One of the things we wanted to accomplish with our “Sama Heart of Gold Five Ways Over Five Days” was to demonstrate how exceptionally versatile these handmade sunglasses by Sama are as an accessory.

The Heart of Gold is really jewelry for your face;  so like a ring, necklace or pair of earrings, you want to know that your investment has legs in terms of how many different ways you can pair it.

The first two looks we put together were a little more opulent — perfect for a summer wedding or formal event when the days are still long and you can wear your sunglasses into the evening hours.

Today’s look is a bit more understated.

We wanted to show how you take the Heart of Gold and accessorize them with day wear — letting you transition flawlessly from the office, to lunch, to dinner without doing much more than perhaps swapping out your shoes.

The look below combines the cool whites and neutral grays of an sophisticated shirt dress from Alice + Olivia with jewelry in yellow gold, diamonds and precious stones that once again play off from the Swarovski crystals in the Heart of Gold’s temples.

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We Got A Glimpse of the New John Galliano and Tod’s Line of Sunglasses and You Are Going to LOVE Them!

This week  Marcolin, the U.S. distributor of Tom Ford, Tod’s and DSquared2, stopped in to show us the new sunglass lines from John Galliano and Tod’s.

At first we were a little skeptical.

We’ve been searching for some new eyewear lines to add at Urban Optiques for several months now, and what we’ve seen so far (outside of Francis Klein) hasn’t particularly impressed us.

We pretty much knew what we didn’t want:  Yet another line of sunglasses from some giant corporate design center with yet another fashion designer’s name stuck on the temple with something akin to Super Glue as an afterthought.

There are tons of those brands out there, and outside of the designer logo itself, there’s really not much in terms of unique design to differentiate these eyewear lines from each other.

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