There aren’t many Optician Awards Frame of the Year winners that can lay claim to having adorned the faces of Grace Kelly and Linda Evangelista, but this year’s winner, the Norum from Claire Goldsmith and Oliver Goldsmith Sunglasses has done just that.
Designed in 1958 by Oliver Goldsmith, the Norum sunglass sits within the company’s collection of Oliver Goldsmith Sunglasses reissues. If things are getting slightly confusing at this point, then it’s worth noting that Oliver Goldsmith and Oliver Goldsmith Sunglasses are two separate entities, and the latter is under the stewardship of the Claire Goldsmith Eyewear brand.
To question whether eyewear design is in the DNA of the Goldsmith family would be like asking which branch of the christian faith the Pope subscribes to. Twentieth century icons such as Grace Kelly and Michael Caine wore Oliver Goldsmith’s thick black frames, while the large white sunglasses worn by Audrey Hepburn are a locked-on part of her image.
Claire Goldsmith, the great granddaughter of Oliver, created the company in 2010. ‘As a child I used to pore over the pictures of iconic celebrities and models wearing Oliver Goldsmith glasses. Michael Caine, Audrey Hepburn, Grace Kelly, and Peter Sellers, were the poster boys and girls for style-defining eyewear. I’m proud to be a guardian of the brand,’ she says.
The same principles of Oliver Goldsmith craftsmanship are still in place, but Claire Goldsmith offers something new – modern designs to go with the old school sensibilities.
The Icons range takes the most memorable silhouettes from the Oliver Goldsmith archives and reimagines them with treatments, finishes and colours. For the Norum silhouette, that re-creation involved utilising new hues of Mazzucchelli’s environmentally friendly M49 acetate – in this instance, the Blue Rainbow colour scheme – ‘the colour every ocean should be,’ says Goldsmith.
Although the design process for Norum was slightly different than that of Claire Goldsmith’s own frames, it still started out like all the others – a pair of lenses, a piece of acetate and imagination. ‘The frame winning the award is very symbolic of what good design means,’ she says.
‘The design is now 57 years old but a panel of judges picked it out as a winner in 2015 – it shows that good, simple design really does stand the test of time.
‘The more processes you add to the design of a product, the less pure it becomes, she adds. ‘We don’t embellish too much, we keep things simple.’
At a packed Hilton Metropole in Birmingham, Claire Goldsmith and head of international sales Yoann Foechterlé, were waiting with bated breath alongside the likes of Kirk and Kirk, William Morris London and Eyespace, any of whom would have made worthy winners.
‘We were shocked when our name was read out on the night – an evening which we thought was smart and really well organised,’ says Goldsmith.
‘As a company we are not very good at putting ourselves forward for awards entries and I usually don’t allow us to enter them because I don’t believe in self-nomination. However, Zoe Cosby, our press and PR manager at the time, entered us without me knowing and I’m very glad she did.’
Frame of the Year
Winner: Claire Goldsmith and Oliver Goldsmith Sunglasses – Norum
Shortlisted
Kirk and Kirk, William Morris London,
Eyespace