Essay
Every eyewear brand puts its name on the side of your head. We think that is a strange thing to have agreed to.
Look at the temple of almost any frame made in the last thirty years and you will find a name on it. Usually in metal, usually near the hinge, usually the largest piece of type on the object.
It is worth asking who that is for.
It is not for you
You cannot see it. It sits in your peripheral vision at best, and most of the time it is behind your ear. The only people who read the logo on your glasses are the people looking at you, which makes it the one piece of design on the frame that is aimed entirely away from its owner.
The adventurous choice should be in the silhouette, not the branding.
There is a reasonable defence of this. A logo is a guarantee — it says who made the thing and stands behind it. We agree with the principle. We disagree that the guarantee needs to be forty millimetres long and visible from across a room.
Where ours goes
Inside the left temple, in the same place as the measurements, at the same size. If you want to know what you are wearing you take them off and read it. Everyone else gets the shape.
What this costs us
Recognition, mostly. A visible logo is free advertising on the face of every customer, and giving it up means the frame has to be identifiable by shape alone — which is a much harder brief, and a fair one. If a silhouette is not distinctive enough to be recognised without a nameplate, the answer is a better silhouette.
We would rather be asked what they are than have it read off the side.
