Have you ever been about to play a sport, whether tennis, volleyball, soccer, or anything in between, and realized your sunglasses just weren’t going to cut it? Normal sunglasses are not very useful when you’re playing sports. They fall off easily, you’re concerned about breaking them, and they don’t provide the best protection. If you are an active individual who spends his or her free time or weekends participating in sports or other athletic activities, it is important to have a pair (or two) of sports sunglasses to protect your eyes and fit your needs. While it is important to have functional sports sunwear, that doesn’t mean they have to be unfashionable. Designers like Oakley and Maui Jim offer comfort, durability, and style.

Sports sunglasses are important because of their design. The frames are designed for comfort and protection. They fit snugly to the head and lenses wrap around the sides a bit to offer protection for your peripheral vision. The lenses are made out of a more durable and shatter-resistant material than most sunwear.

Sport sunglass lenses are designed to block certain wavelengths of light and bring clarity to your vision by increasing your contrast sensitivity. This helps you to see your surroundings in a higher definition than you would be able to without the lenses. The clearer you can see, the faster you can respond, and wearing the right sunglasses can help you up your game!

Grey or black tints help you retain accurate color perception, while yellow and brown tints help with contrast enhancement. Also, remember the importance of UV protection! Sports sunglasses should help improve your performance by clearing your vision, but they should also protect your eyes. The color of the lenses does not determine how much UV it blocks. Make sure you purchase glasses that are 100% UV blocking. Good Looks Eyewear offers sports sunwear collections from Oakley, Maui Jim, and others at their Cranberry and Pittsburgh locations.

You’ve come to an important crossroads: should you get contacts or not? There are many factors to consider.

Types of Contacts

There are multiple types of contacts. Soft contact lenses are comfortable and easy to wear full time, or just occasionally. There is little to no adjustment period with these lenses. You can also get daily contacts, lenses that you throw away at the end of each day, in this form. This eliminates the need to clean your contacts. The downside to soft lenses is that they do not offer the sharpest vision.

Rigid gas permeable contact lenses, also called RGP or GP lenses, on the other hand, must be worn daily to be comfortable. They usually require a 1-2 week adjustment period before they feel completely comfortable on the eye, as they are rigid. They provide the sharpest vision you can achieve with contacts, and can help correct astigmatisms. They do not come in a daily disposable form.

If you want the clarity of the RGP lenses but the comfort of the soft lenses, you can get hybrid lenses, which have rigid centers for clear vision, but a “skirt” of soft lens to make the contact comfortable. The downside of hybrid lenses is the price, as they can be more expensive than both regular soft and RGP lenses.

Things to Consider

You need to consider what type of contacts you want, if you prefer the daily soft lenses that require no care, or the RGP or hybrid lenses, which require an adjustment period and more care but give you clearer vision. If you decide against daily lenses and decide to get lenses that you will be wearing daily for some interval of time, you must consider the cleaning process. You must clean and disinfect the lenses daily, or you run the risk of harming your eyes through the buildup of dust, allergens, and debris on the lenses. Cleaning is fairly straightforward, and usually all you need is the right cleaning solution and a case for the lenses. If your teen or child wants contacts, you must consider their responsibility, as caring for the lenses correctly is very important. It is also important to NEVER try on someone else’s contacts or let them use yours. Doing so can cause eye infections and spread of disease.

If you are interested in getting contacts for extended wear – that is, overnight wear, talk to your doctor. Only certain contacts are designed for extended wear, and most people’s eyes can’t handle them. Whether or not the lenses are meant for it, you shouldn’t always wear your contacts overnight or for extended periods of time, as it deprives your eyes of oxygen and cause serious damage to the cornea. Talk to your doctor about whether or not you are a good candidate for extended wear contact lenses.

Do you have dry eyes or allergies that affect your eyes? If so, contacts might not be a good idea, period. This is another issue to discuss with your doctor. He or she can give you a clearer idea of whether contact lenses are a good choice for you, and point you towards options that will fit your needs.

Contact lenses are a wonderful way to enjoy clearer vision without glasses. While they don’t completely eliminate of your need for glasses, they can give you a nice break from your frames. If you want to get contact lenses, consider the information above and talk to your doctor about your options. Good Looks Eyewear in Cranberry and Pittsburgh offers eye exams to assess your needs and many different contact options to fill them! Come by for a check up and fitting.

One of Good Looks Eyewear’s main suppliers for frames is Kenmark Optical. Kenmark offers a portfolio of designer brands, including Kensie, and Original Penguin, but the line we’re focusing on today is Vera Wang. I recently had the opportunity to speak to David Duralde, the lead designer for Vera Wang Eyewear at Kenmark, about their work and the process that brings us the beautiful Vera Wang eyewear styles that we know and love.

“The work at Kenmark is an intellectual and creative collaboration between the production team at Kenmark and the fashion team from the designer.” Says Duralde.

Kenmark is a unique operation. Each brand has an in-house designer, but they work directly with the fashion designers whose names are on the finished product. Kenmark works with designers who want to be involved in the process, to the point that the final product can truly be called their design. Vera Wang in particular is very involved in the creation of her eyewear. Known for her innovative designs and ability to capture the style of the modern American woman in her collections, Vera Wang brings her values and personal flare to the eyewear collections and is deeply involved in the design process from beginning to end. According to Duralde, his role at Kenmark is to support Wang with the technical side of things while she gives the fashion direction.

OCTAVIA from the Vera Wang Salon collection, found at Good Looks Eyewear

Both the technical and fashion designers have a style obligation: to make people feel good and look good, and Vera Wang and the production team at Kenmark spare no time or expense to fulfill that obligation. The development cycle for eyewear lasts 9-15 months, and involves discussions about color themes, moods, shapes, and patterns for the collection. Kenmark designers then take that information and use it as a basis for the first drafts of eyewear sketches, which Wang edits herself. When prototypes are made of best designs, she tries them on to assess their comfort, detail, and quality. There are often more rounds of edits and prototypes before the final design is approved.

According to Duralde, it is very important to Wang that her designs are appropriate, balanced, and composed, as they are worn by a diverse group of women in many different settings. Every woman wearing Vera Wang eyewear must look fabulous, chic, and at the top of her game. The pieces must fulfill these criteria before Wang will put her name and label on them. This makes the process and the final product very personalized. Wang herself is the hardest critic because she won’t sell something that she wouldn’t wear herself. In fact, she is often seen wearing pieces from her eyewear lines!

The Vera Wang collections use components that are sourced from all over the world. A single pair of frames might contain hinges from Austria, plastics from Japan, and a nose pad from France, Duralde told me. Outsourcing allows Kenmark and Vera Wang to achieve the exact colors, textures, and quality they desire without limitation in materials. The use of unique components from global sources is part of Wang’s innovative philosophy.

As you can see, Vera Wang pays great attention to detail. Jewel work, as seen in the Luxe collection, is hand-drawn and cast into the frames using the same techniques as fine jewelers. These aren’t just gems glued to the frames, and they add dimension to the piece while giving the customer confidence in the quality and durability of the design.

“Our mission is to make your patients look beautiful.” Duralde told me. “We aren’t just throwing something together and hoping the frames will sell.”

Kenmark and Vera Wang work hard to make sure that every piece has a background of careful planning to embody the designer’s values and appeal to women throughout America. The quality work, technique, and attention to detail that make up the total design show how Vera Wang fulfills this mission. The frame shapes are hand drawn, so the curves are all unique and never cookie-cutter, based on the lines of a face and what complements it. Kenmark and Vera Wang are always keeping eyewear professionals and customers in mind while they create their products.

TAFFE from the Vera Wang Luxe collection, found at Good Looks Eyewear

David Duralde says that his favorite part of the design process is fitting people for frames at trunk shows. He finds the greatest excitement in finding the perfect pair of frames for a woman, and seeing how happy she feels in them. To witness people feeling so good and so beautiful in the styles his team has worked so hard to create is very fulfilling.

“Seeing the finished products on the people that they were created for, and seeing the excitement they cause, is where the love and passion for what we do comes from.” 

Due to Vera Wang’s passion for innovation, endless curiosity, and boundary pushing, the collection is always moving and changing. The goal is to go out, find what’s next, and bring it back. In order to design what people will be wearing next year, the team must immerse themselves in studying, living, and breathing the future before it even happens! It’s a creative road and Kenmark and Vera Wang want their customers to be part of that journey!

Good Looks Eyewear in Cranberry and Pittsburgh offers Vera Wang Salon and Luxe collections. Come by to experience Vera Wang’s innovative designs!