Vera Wang—the design name that has brought simple elegance to wedding gown couture has now done the same with eyewear.
The Vera Wang Luxe eyewear collection is both classic and sophisticated. It includes 11 ophthalmic styles and nine sunglass styles with frames made of acetate, cobalt, beta titanium, and zyl. Styles include supras, rimless, and metals. Colors include gold metal, silver metal, horn, matte black metal, lilac metal, as well as other neutrals. The frame style known as Classic, with its oval shape, has a delicate look and comes in metal, gold, silver, matte black, or copper finishes.
The sunglass line offers polycarbonate, glass, and CR39 with A-R coatings, as well as polarized surfaces and gradient tints. Goggle style and flat-based lenses are also available. Vera Wang sunglasses are impressive in both style and design.
Specialty elements in the Luxe collection include buffalo horn, gold and palladium finishes, and jeweled touches. Functional features include spring hinges and saddle bridges to assure comfort and wearability, in addition to fashion. Some styles also feature the Vera Wang logo on the inside of the frame.
For example, as its name suggests, Feline is a modified cat’s eye shape with a metal frame that comes in Moroccan, cream horn, and Kona horn colors. The style called Glacier, made of titanium, has a modified aviator shape and comes in nude, cabernet, or champagne color ways. For a more avant garde look, try Fission. With its rounded bottom edge and square top, it is sure to turn heads. This plastic frame comes in lavender cream, sienna, oyster, black, and brown. Its sister version, Fission Horn, comes in Moroccan cream horn, savannah horn, Kona horn.
Vera Wang frame styles include cats-eyes and Jackie O shapes with a glamorous edge. To complement this glamorous look, Vera Wang recently added Swarosvski crystal elements to its sunglass line. Frame colors include brown, tabac, tortoise, black, and crystal. The collections also offer polarized lenses and gradient tints.
Dainty, feminine, sleek, and curvaceous are all adjectives used to describe the various frame styles of the Vera Wang collections. For example, style number 64 from her sunglass line, has a romantic yet playful look. Made of zyl with plastic lenses, this style offers a two-textured look and is available in tabac, black, black tortoise, and crystal.
Known to many as a classic modernist, Vera Wang designs for woman who are looking for grace as well as technology in their eye wear fashion. Simple and luxurious, the styles in the Luxe Collection reflect the independent character of the wearer. Because of her attention to detail, and modern yet sophisticated approach to design, Wang has succeeded in designing eyewear that is both very beautiful and at the same time practical.
Defined by its clean lines, the Vera Wang style now reaches a wider audience than ever and is also more affordable. The collections use unique technology and luxurious materials to design what the designer defines as an essential accessory that brings a refined style to its wearer. In addition, the designer pays particular attention to the fit and shape of the glasses.
“I’ve always been fascinated with eyewear. It reflects a woman’s style as much as her clothing or make-up. In creating my eyewear, I consider both the technical and fashion aspects with the same modernity and simplicity found in my clothing. As with my dresses, I want people to appreciate the eyewear, but focus on the woman,” says Wang.
Vera Wang opened for business in 1990 as a fashion designer who built her business on couture wedding gowns. Since then, she has added many elements to the business including eyewear in 2002, which, she says, is a natural extension to the business.
Wang considers eyewear to be a fashion accessory much like makeup and says the shape of a frame or the color of a lens can “change the entire appearance of the wearer.” And most importantly, because eyewear is inexpensive, it is accessible to all consumers. “You don’t have to be wealthy to collect eyewear. Many women have three and four pair.”
Wang finds designing eyewear challenging yet enjoyable. Admitting that she is a detail-oriented person, she applies this trait to her eyewear design and designs for the many different roles of today’s woman: athlete, business executive, housewife, mother, traditionalist. “I am intrigued with a woman’s facial structure, style, and even her outlook on life. As with my dresses, I want people to appreciate the eyewear, but focus on the woman.”
Technology and Science: Their Effects on Eyewear
Today, Wang acknowledges the importance of technology and science when it comes to designing eyewear and feels technologies like polarization took eyewear to a new level during the 90s. She adds that materials currently on the market will take it even further and adds she became more attuned to the functional aspects of eyewear when she took up the sport of golf. “I had a lot of difficulty finding an attractive rimless golf style that offered a good overall view.”
Born to Chinese parents in 1949, Vera Wang grew up in New York and aspired to be an Olympic figure skater. When that career did not pan out, Wang studied at the Sorbonne in France, then at Sarah Lawrence College in the United States. Before becoming a designer of her own collections, Wang was an editor at Vogue magazine for 17 years, and then worked at Ralph Lauren. In 1990, she began designing bridal and eveningwear and started her own label in 1994.
Manufactured in Italy and Japan, the Vera Wang and Vera Wang Luxe Collections are designed with a subtle elegance and simple beauty that is synonymous with the name Vera Wang.
