With my sunglasses on, I’m Jack Nicholson. Without them, I’m fat and 60. — Jack Nicholson, Actor
Starting with this quote from famous actor Jack Nicholson we can see how much a stylish pair of sunglasses can change our look and influence our public appearance. Known as the no. 1 accessory for celebrities and style addicts it also can help us – besides protection from the sun – help look better. Not only do we have a much better view in very light environments, we can express our attitude and our view of the world with a stylish pair of sunglasses.
You think this is to provocative? Then remember Holly Golightly in Truman Capotes masterpiece “Breakfast at Tiffanys”. What would she be without her classic dark shaded sunglasses? Can you imagine here standing at the storefront, watching the gems without this absolutely beautiful pair of glasses? Her impression and appearance would have been totally different. Or think of Neo and Trinity in the Matrix trilogy. Can you imagine them fighting against the several Mr. Smith’s without their shades? By the way, Carrie-Anne Moss, the actress who played Trinity, stated, that once she puts on her sunglasses, people recognize her. Bad luck for Ms. Moss 🙂
So assuming that we have a common understanding that sunglasses are a must-have accessory for stylish people we next take a look at what the new styles for sunglasses in summer 2009 are. In this article we will mainly focus on the brands Oakley, Emporio Armani, Dolce & Gabbana and Quiksilver.
Let us start with Oakley. If we take a look at a their sunglasses collection, we see, that Oakley continues with their very dominant “braod” style. Although we see some more fragile models like the new “Splinter” or “Square Whisker” ones, the greater part is their aggressive and very dominating line they introduced once with their “Oil Drum” models. With Oakley you always can see that they also build functional / sports goggles for snowboarding as a lot of the elements of those product lines were utilized for the sunglasses as well. Some typical models underpinning this statement are “Fives Squared” and “Antix”. Also it seems with Oakley that they find back to use more colorful lines than in the past season. The “Antix” and special edition (like Sebastion Loeb Antix) are a good example for this. Although black is still the dominant color (most of the time with grey or black glasses) they are again moving to some “new freshness”.
The next brand we want to take a look at is Emporio Armani. If we dive into the Men’s / Accessories / Sunglasses section we see that Armani has a very similar style like Oakley. They use the same ingredients (aggressive / dominant) with the same basic colors (black). As their product line do not focus mainly on sunglasses we see less models than with other brands but some models seem outstanding. In the Men’s section the “Extra Wrapping Sport Mask” needs to be mentioned. It is a seamless pair of sunglasses looking very sportive, as the name may already have supposed. Those glasses give a very “broad look” but with the matching clothing (casual wear e. g. some nice bermudas with a body fit shirt) it will look spectacular. This model is perfect for a day at the beach with your friends although we think you have to be a little careful as the glasses look somehow fragile.
If you head over to the sunglasses women’s section you can clearly see what makes Emporio Armanis style for girls this year. Oval oversized glasses with some black to purple colors and some very nice applications on the side pieces. The “Armani bird”, which forms their logo is very prominent as with all sunglasses of Emporio. The one that stands out in this collection from the author’s point of view is the “Oval oversize very feminine” model. It has a translucent frame with very nice shaded glasses. The black temples are in a nice contrast to the light looking glasses which would be matching nicely with a decent make-up. Those glasses are perfect for a night out or for some shopping in the town as they guide the views towards the wearers face.
Dolce & Gabbana are – as always – quite eccentric this year. They demand some braveness from their customers as they have some colorful models compared to the other brands mentioned in this article. One of the more decent models is the D&G 6020 with a very broad side piece and black glasses. It’s is colored in black with the Dolce & Gabbana line clearly visible on the side. Perfect if you are a celebrity and want to go out for dinner without being recognized every five meters. One similar model is the 6017B which has the famous D&G logo as connector between glasses and temples and therefore having the brand a little bit more present. These are also available in a tortoise color which are a good addition to earthly colored clothing. Similar as Oakley, D&G offers some seamless glasses, here we mention the models 6036 and 6036B which are available in several colors such as tortoise, black and shades of brown. Even more stylish are the new models 4040G, 4041G and 4043G all of them stuffed with some very eye-catching Swarovski crystals. The last mentioned (4043G) has them applied in multiple colors and makes the wearers face shiny and glamorous.
Lastly Quiksilver – a manufacturer of sportive clothing, gear, accessories and sandals – has some fresh approach to their 2009 collection. Coming from a history as one of the classic brands for surfers and water-loving people they have some more colors related to water and water-sports like the cyan-colored “moonwalker” models in a very classic shape. Also Quiksilver has a some blue glasses available which became very popular in the past few years. Following the general trend of broad sunglasses mentioned with the other brands, Quiksilver offers some quite “thin” models like “J&D “, “Ferris” and “Griffin”. They also have some color variations like the at the moment popular tortoise look which was mentioned with some other brands before.
Altogether we can see that it will be a hot summer with a lot of chances to express your own style and personality through some stylish sunglasses which will give the finishing touch to your appearance.
Phil Kowalski is a fashion addict providing you with top priced sunglasses for women’s and mens