This article is best viewed in a PDF Format.
|
|
|
|
Think of inspirational children with glasses and you will probably come up with Harry Potter battling the powers of evil with his trusty specs. However kids are increasingly looking closer to home for their optical cues. In fact, far from rebelling against their parents in classic teenage fashion, children now can't wait to grow up and wear the same frames as dear old mum and dad.
Overall the children's market is shifting upwards age-wise with conventional children's frames, which are still very relevant for younger children, being turned aside at a lower age than before.
'Trends for the coming school year point towards a replication of current adult styles,' comments Peter Beaumont, director at Dunelm Optical. 'Plastic frames for girls seem to be doing very well at the moment, whereas metals are doing better for boys. In general, bright colours are a popular choice with the younger market. Boys' styles tend to have more subdued colours, whereas girls tend to be slightly more adventurous. Heavy sides and strong colours are a clear trend at the moment, following adult styles in general.'
Actman has recently extended its range with Junior Sprout and Squirt. Featuring a dainty daisy design, Actman Junior Sprout has a directional angular eyeshape in shiny multi-tone acetate. With spring hinges discretely concealed, the frame has also been designed for child-friendly function and will help to keep a perfect fit. Actman Junior Squirt is said to be a scholarly frame that offers a little holiday fun in term time with an imaginative display of ocean blue splashed with silver on the metal sides. 'Our point of difference however is the fashion element, our styles reflect the major eyewear trends, giving kids the confidence to wear the frames with street-cred style,' says Andrew Actman.
Brulimar, is launching its first ever children's collection for Bench in September. Drawing inspiration from the adult equivalent, the Bench Kids range targets young boys and girls aged from seven through to mid-teens. It includes 14 designs using rectangular eye shapes, lightweight stainless steel and a warm colour palette including pinks, blues and greens. Brulimar has also unveiled its new curl-sided temple technology, designed for small children. These pliable, memory plastic sides offer a solution for active kids who have difficulty keeping their frames on throughout the day. Once the child has become used to wearing the frames, the flexible sides can be remoulded into a regular hockey temple.
'We try wherever possible to emulate the adult fashion shapes into the children's designs. It's just not necessary for kids to be saddled with over sized and in many cases unfashionable eyewear. Fashion is making its mark on children's designs, particularly in this age range where children are starting to choose their own eyewear, and features include more rectangular eyeshapes, wider temples, and modern materials including lightweight metals,' says Howard Librae, managing director of Brulimar. 'Despite this trend towards fashion, durability and comfort are still crucial so flex hinges and soft nose pads remain key components.'
Continental Eyewear has recently released several new Lazer children's frames in acetate. All are available in four colours and satisfy the demand from children for more distinctive eyewear. Denim, claret and black acetate are just three of the available colours and many feature an eyecatching animal print pattern on the inside of the temples.
Meanwhile Dunelm has acknowledged the changes in the children's trends with new additions. 'With both our GR8KIDS and Whiz Kids ranges, some frames are also available with curl sides, ensuring children don't need to worry during sports or PE lessons,' says Beaumont. 'Both ranges are suitable for children of all ages. GR8KIDS includes 18 frames and Whiz Kids has 40 frames to choose from. With colours ranging from bright pinks and blues to the more subdued bronze and greys, the ranges incorporate both metals and plastics into the frame design, to give a wide variety of choice for fashion-conscious youngsters.'
Recognising the importance of durability, the designers at Eye'DC have concentrated on improving junior frame resistance. The upshot of this is Gum, which utilises the rarely used over-moulding technique for comfort. Said to be as malleable as chewing gum, the hinge-free temples can twist and turn in all directions.
Focusing on ic!Berlin's Chika design for children, this weighs in at a mere 13g and because they are constructed without screws or welding there is less risk of components being lost. The unisex children's designs are available in three different colours: chrome, black and matt copper.
Thanks to the flexibility and strength of the titanium wire, the Lindberg Kid range is heralded as being resistant to the rough and tumble of life in the playground, while also boasting lightness, flexibility and adaptability. The titanium material is said to allow opticians to achieve a perfect fit and is also hypoallergenic.
A new concept for boys is the Vulkan pirate range, devised by Orange Eyewear, and offering full rim and supra designs in four colours. A skull and crossbones detail is subtly embossed on the tip of the plastic sides. The company has also added further to the Vulkani Princess range, in a full-rim frame with a gold princess crown detail. Suited to teenager requirements is Model 40 from the Nici Eyewear line, which has an intricate and sophisticated design on the acetate sides.
Style-savvy children
Hanna Nussbaum, managing director of Orange Eyewear, said: 'Children and teenagers are becoming increasingly style-savvy and both the Vulkani and Nici ranges allow them to experiment with an array of unique designer styles and colours without costing their parents the earth.'
A particularly strong brand emerging in the children's market is Converse, trading as it does on its links with sportswear and latterly rock music. Many of its frames come in children's sizes with no alterations. 'Three models - Dunk, Freethrow and Rebound - all feature memory metal and it is the first time that we've introduced this material in the Converse line,' explains Robert Wilson, owner of The Eyewear Company. 'We thought it would be an important feature to add, especially to the kids' product. Dunk and Freethrow both have memory metal bridges and temples, whereas, model Rebound only has a memory bridge. I wanted to keep the design feature on the temple for model Rebound which is why I only added a memory bridge to this model.'
'Since kids seem to react to colourful models, I used two-tone colours for all three models.'
Two-tone colours are also used with model Stitch, while Nitro has a stainless steel top bar. 'We also added a small laser cut on the temple to reveal the second color in the acetate. Since this is a much more fashion-forward look, we wanted to keep the temple design very minimal by only adding a small laser cut and the Converse logo.'
Norville's range of children's Polaroid sun clips, Shade Control 4Kidz, are similar in design to the adult Shade Control with an internally sprung patented bridge design. For babies up to early teens Play Time Kids Eyewear is a sprung-sided colourful collection. This features supras and full rims, with rectangular shapes, while soft curl sides for the youngest wearers come in silver blue and baby pink. ?