Yesterday, Detroit-based national mortgage company Quicken Loans announced their millionth closed loan with a letter on their homepage (written in Comic Sans, no less) from founder and Chairman Dan Gilbert, a full-page ad in USA TODAY and a truly entertaining “mini-movie” about the guy who is put “in charge” of watching for the “millionth loan.”

Urban Optiques provided the sunglasses that appear on the two “men in black” in the elevator, the guys charged with making sure the millionth loan arrives safely to its destination.

The featured sunglasses are the Badgley Mischka Charles and the Prada PR65HS.  Both are rectangle-shaped aviators. Great choices to get that FBI/Secret Service/Private Security dude look.

You can watch the entire video below.  Make sure you sit through the entire story, the film flips style toward the end and there is a very cool surprise twist.

On behalf of the team at Urban Optiques, we’d like to congratulate everyone at Quicken Loans (many of whom are patients and clients of Urban Optiques) on achieving 1 million closed loans!

Our friends over at the Destination: Sama boutique in West Beverly Hills just sent us a picture they snapped of NBA basketball star Danny Granger in his new Badgley Mischka “Steve” aviator sunglasses.

The “Steve” sunglass that Danny Granger is sporting is actually a new model from Badgley Mischka Eyewear and Sama and will be released later this month.

Granger is pictured below wearing the “Steve” in gold with 24K gold lenses. We’re still waiting for confirmation from Sama on other color variations, but we do know it will also be available in Clove with special triple gradient-lenses.

If you are interested in pre-ordering the Badgley Mischka “Steve” please give us a call at 248-347-9090 or email us at: seebeseen@urbanoptiques.com and we’ll put you on the V.I.P priority list for this hot new model.

Danny Granger in Badgley Mischka “Steve” Sunglasses

Badgley Mischka “Steve” Sunglasses in Gold with 24K Gold Special Edition Lenses

Badgley Mischka “Steve” Sunglasses in Clove with Special Edition Triple Gradient Lenses

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.

John Galliano and His Sunglasses to the Rescue!

But when Marcolin pulled out the John Galliano sunglasses, all of our eyes lit up around Urban Optiques.

Based on what we saw, we’re pretty confident the new John Galliano and Tod’s suns are going to be huge hits with our clients and patients this summer.

Even better, they truly embody the brand and design aesthetic associated with the designer and fashion behind the name.

The collections are extremely deep out-of-the gate for a new line, providing a great mix of aviators and Italian Zyle frames in both men’s, women’s and unisex designs.

Even better, the collections represent a clear contrast in styles and design aesthetics that we think fill unique niches for our clients and will appeal to different fashion sensibilities.

The new John Galliano sunglasses are pretty much exactly what you’d expect from this fashion maverick.

They are trendy, a bit edgy, and clearly convey the creative, artistic — and often controversial — philosophy that has made John Galliano one of the most daring and respected fashion designers in the world.

That said, the Galliano sunglass line is extremely diverse. We saw plenty of sunglass frames from John Galliano that we are certain will appeal to even our more conservative clients.

On the other hand, if you want to walk more on the wild side, he has plenty of options for you as well. If you want to play it safer (but still fashionable), you are covered also with this sunglass collection.

One of Galliano’s fashion muses is the Bolero dancer of his native Spain and the new Galliano Sunglass Collection — like his couture fashion — draws inspiration from the Bolero.

The sunglass pictured above was inspired by the intricate, decorative hair clips worn by Bolero dancers and he incorporated the Arabesque-like designs of the hair clips into the sunglass temples.

All of Galliano’s sunglasses (each of which Galliano personally designed), feature these unique visual twists, making the collection one of the most exciting and unique entries  into the designer fashion eyewear market that we’ve seen in several years.

We can’t wait to start putting these suns on people’s faces.

The Tod’s Sunglass Collection: Inspired by Tod’s Heritage of Fine Leather Accessories

And then there are the Tod’s.

Just when we thought the Gallianos surely couldn’t be matched, Marcolin pulled out the Tod’s for us.

Best known for their luxury leather goods (including the Tod’s leather driving shoes, the Gommino loafer and D-Bag handbags), this renowned Italian luxury design house has infused its new eyewear collection with the same level of attention to detail and use of  fine materials (including leather) that mark their shoes and handbags.

While the Galliano and Tod’s eyewear collections are quite different, one thing they both share is their attention to unique shapes, designs and materials.

Particularly impressive was the way Tod’s balanced acetate and metal frames, and put some novel spins in the classic aviator.

In a clear nod to Tod’s legacy of designing and producing luxury leather products, the sunglass collection offers a line of aviators that have leather covered frames, which are simply gorgeous and will fly off the shelves, in our opinion.

There is no other sunglass on the market that we know of that literally wraps the entire frame in leather.

Like Galliano, Tod’s should be commended for providing a broad range of shapes, styles, sizes and materials in their sunglasses.

The versatility across these two collections is what makes them really attractive. We wish we had more pix of the Galliano and Tod’s sunglasses, because they really are amazing.

If it’s any consolation (and, yes we know we are being teases tonight) within a few weeks we’ll have them in the store for you to try on and experience for yourself.

We’re particularly excited to be one of only four Michigan eyewear boutiques that will be authorized to carry the new Galliano and Tod’s sunglass collections.

Nationally, availability of the line will also be constrained to a very limited number of retailers (we’re talking less than 100 here.)

The sunglass lines from Tod’s and John Galliano fit perfectly with our philosophy of offering designer and luxury eyewear product that you can’t easily find anywhere else and we know our clients will love them.

In the coming weeks, we’ll highlight more of the Galliano and Tod’s sunglasses as we get them in.

If you would like to pre-order from the collections or are interested in attending a yet-unscheduled trunk show of these two new lines, please e-mail us to placed on the the invitation list.

We love it when designers prominently feature their eyewear lines in their seasonal fashion collections.

It’s even better when they put their eyewear on the runways.

Which is exactly what Mark Badgley and James Mischka did during their Spring/Summer 2010 preview at the 11th Amsterdam International Fashion Week.

The spring/summer ready-to-wear collection from Badgley Mischka was stunning enough on its own.

But what really made it sizzle was Badgley Mischka’s decision to place its couture sunwear on every single model on the catwalk:

This made for one of the most conspicuous displays of sunglasses in any major collection this year (and possibly in history), which of course makes us overjoyed, since we carry both the Badgley Mischka Couture Eyewear Collection and the very sunglass models featured in Amsterdam.

After more than a decade of silver dominating eyewear, it was also refreshing to Badgley Mischka pair gold sunwear with their spring/summer fashions.

White gold made a showing as well, but the emphasis was definitely on yellow, which perfectly complimented the warm browns, bronzes and golds in the Amsterdam collection.

Badgley Mischka and Sama deserve much of the credit for reviving the aviator style sunglass and making it chic and fashionable again.

The Perry with 22k gold lenses (which is repeatedly featured in the Amsterdam show) is a favorite of Angelina Jolie and other celebs and recently made an appearance in Rhianna’s So Hard video.

According to Brian Glascow of Sama Eyewear, the sunglass designs featured in the Badgley Mischka Amsterdam collection were custom made by Sama with special couture lenses especially for the show.

Out of this concept was the birth of the 22k and 18k gold lenses that are available as a premium couture option on select Badgley Mischka frames like the Boyd and Perry.

While aviators have been slowly making a comeback for the better part of two years, there really hasn’t been an ultra-premium, couture alternative to the classic Ray-Ban until Badgley Mischka and Sheila Vance of Sama introduced the 22k gold version of the Perry and Boyd sunglasses.

The Amsterdam show from Badgley Mischka also shows how versatile the aviator truly is (once you lux it up a bit.)

Notice how effortlessly the gold Badgley Mischka sunglasses move from formal wear, to flirty summer dresses, to swimwear.

There’s a reason that certain designs in eyewear become “classics” and the Badgley Mischka Spring/Summer collection clearly demonstrates the enduring appeal of the metal aviator.

The Badgley Mischka Eyewear models featured in the Amsterdam collection include: Perry, Boyd, Alfie, Corset, Bradley, Grant (Optical Frame) and the Marilyn.

Tomorrow we’ll post the second half of the Amsterdam show, which pairs these fantastic sunglasses up with beach and swimwear designs from the Badgley Mischka summer 2010 collection.