Safilo avante-garde collection is structurally sound

Italian eyewear manufacturer Safilo has partnered with 3D printing specialist Materialise to produce a capsule collection for the avant-garde line, Oxydo.

The ‘wearable sculptures’ in the spring-summer 2017 collection were described as an ‘expression of intent’ to demonstrate what additive manufacturing was capable of today and where it could lead the eyewear industry in the future.

New York-based artist Francis Bitonti, who collaborated with Oxydo for design, said: ‘We focused on leveraging the capabilities of 3D Printing to produce very fine ornamentation while keeping a very minimal silhouette. We were interested in how the next generation of ornamentation might look.’

The range combines classic shapes of round and cat’s eye with ultra-modern structures achievable only through 3D Printing. The shapes that surround each frame are produced at Materialise’s dedicated eyewear production facility in Leuven, Belgium.