Designer Gazal Trabrizipour and her husband Saeed are the dynamic duo behind Gazal Eyewear. You can follow their personal story - designing eyewear, outfitting their new flagship optical, and jetsetting around the world to trade shows with behind the scenes looks at the insider's world of optical design on their instagram account @gazal_eyewear

While the designs are created by Tabrizipour in Georgia, the material sourcing and manufacturing for her frames happens in Japan, the go-to manufacturing hub for high quality and light weight titanium metals. “We use a lot of titanium because the weight of the frames and durability compared to other metals makes a remarkable difference.  I am very focused on the intricate details of each frame design so it is important to utilize the skillset of Japanese manufacturing to bring these details to life.”

Their latest photoshoot featuring Amy Roiland (@afashionnerd) was a collaboration introduced to Trabrizipour by Maarten Weidema. " It was great seeing Amy in all of our designs, she is the first model outside of my husband and I that has been part of the Gazal Eyewear collection."

The flagship Gazal boutique optical store will open later this year in Roswell, Georgia, but already the design aesthetic that has made Gazal Eyewear a success is on display. Exam rooms look sleek with sliding black doors embossed in gold, and the main optical space creates a pure luxury feel with recessed display shelves and uniform white walls and ceilings that let the frames take center stage.

The average American spends more than 10.5 hours a day on digital devices like computers and smart phones, so is it any wonder our eyes are tired at the end of the day?  We're actively using them to look at small print from a lit screen for over 60% of our waking hours!

If you are a contact lens wearer, you may have noticed that your eyes feel more tired when you wear contact lenses than when you wear your glasses.  This is not in your head - it's a scientific fact. Because contact lenses physically sit on your eye, the amount of work and energy your eye muscles use to focus on near objects (like computers and cell phones) is greater than when you wear glasses that sit a few millimeters off your face.  In eyecare lingo we call this accommodative demand: the amount of work muscles have to do to focus up close. But happy contact lens wear is not lost; meet Biofinity Energys.  

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Biofinity Energys is a new monthly disposal contact lens designed with aspheric optics to reduce the accommodative demand on eyes as they focus on near work.  Their proprietary Digital Zone Optics design is not a multifocal so there are no rings, halos, or glare side effects and there is no specific "reading power" in the contact lens.  Instead the power profile of the contact lens changes to match the curvature changes of the eye, ensuring your eye gets an even power grid across the entire contact lens.  That's a lot to digest and even eyecare professionals can get a bit lost in understanding what's happening in this lens, but it all starts with understanding what aspheric optics really means.

Demystifying Aspheric Optics
Let's start with some basic optics.  Our cornea is curved, so when light enters the eye it immediately gets distorted or bent by the fact it passed through a curved plane.  The result is the object you're looking at also looks curved (even if it's not).  This is called spherical aberration - the distortion to vision that occurs simply as a result of the fact our eye is a curved sphere and not flat.

Our cornea is a curved surface, so when light enters, it also gets bent and curved.  The result is an imperfect image entering our eye - one that is bent just like our corneal shape.  This is spherical aberration. via

When we are born, our body is set up to help negate this inherent visual distortion caused by the cornea by offsetting it with the curvature of the lens.  The cornea has what's called positive asphericity (it's more curved in the center, and flatter in the periphery), and the lens at birth and through childhood has negative asphericity.  But the lens is one of the few body parts that never stops growing, adding layers and thickening with every year of life.  At some point in adulthood, the lens changes over from negating corneal asphericity to becoming an added source of positive asphericity itself (much more thick in the center than in the periphery).  That's why adults usually feel like they see more glare and halos (especially with high demand visual tasks like night driving) than they used to.  The lens is thicker, and it's now adding to the distortions that are created by the cornea!

Knowing that we have spherical aberration-caused visual distortions inherent to the eye itself, CooperVision has mapped out the "average" cornea and designed a contact lens to negate the spherical aberrations that are naturally present.  The power profile of the contact lens will change gradually from the central cornea to the peripheral cornea to match the bend and curvature change of the average corneal shape.  The result is a lens that's designed to correct your vision perfectly at each point of the contact lens -- not just a -4.00 throughout the whole lens like most contact lens designs, but a -4.00 right in the center and then maybe a -3.93 right outside, and a -3.87 out at the periphery for example. The goal is that your eye gets only the correction it needs at each point in space, and not more correction than necessary, which would increase the amount of work your eye has to do when looking at something up close like a cell phone or computer (the accommodative demand).

A spherical contact lens will match the optics of our spherical cornea, giving everything a curved or bent shape; aspheric contact lenses are designed to prevent this curved distortion and keep the true dimensions and shape of the objects we are looking at. via

This is the concept behind Biofinity Energys -- there's no bifocal; there's no reading power.  Just a lens designed to match the average cornea's bend to negate any optical distortions that would make the eyes have to work harder to see. 

If you are an astute reader, you may have noticed there are some potential shortcomings of this design.  It does assume an "average" cornea, so if your cornea is far from average then you may not get any visual benefit, or potentially even feel like vision is worse (though you'd have to be pretty far off from average for this).  Some people will notice a vision difference (presumably those that are very average), and some people may notice nothing at all with an aspheric lens design. CooperVision reports from their own study that 8 out of 10 digital device users (using devices at least 4 hours a day, 5 days a week) report Biofinity Energys made their eyes feel less tired.

What About Astigmatism?

Some doctors have tried to use aspheric contact lenses to mask low amounts of astigmatism, There is data to support this! A 2004 study comparing aspheric contact lenses to spherical contact lenses (in this case CooperVision's Frequency 55 lenses) found that aspheric optic designs can mask 66% of the astigmatism in patients with an average astigmatism amount of 0.69D.  If your patient has -0.75D of astigmatism or more, they'll likely need a toric lens for statistically significant improved visual correction, but for low astigmatism amounts there is evidence you can mask over half of it with an aspheric design. Spherical lenses only masked 21% of low amounts of astigmatism in the same study.



Who Is This Lens For?

The key to fitting success with Biofinity Energys is to understand what the lens does and what the lens doesn't do.  It won't give a reading boost to people needing reading glasses.  There is no reading power anywhere in this contact lens.  But if you have teens, millennials, or even pre-presbyopes that aren't needing reading glasses yet but are feeling end of day eye strain and fatigue, this lens is a perfect recommendation.  Patients usually won't see any differently reading letters on a chart, but how their eyes feel when they adjust to look up close - that's what the difference will be if they are having issues with eye fatigue in their previous contact lens brand.

When I fit Biofinity Energys, this is what I tell my patients:

"Mr. Jones, you told me your eyes were feeling really tired at the end of the day. There's a new contact lens design I want you to try that can relieve some of the strain on your eyes when you're looking at computers or your phone.  Most people don't notice that they see any differently, but how your eyes feel at the end of the day -- that's what this lens can improve.  I can keep your vision clear and sharp like what you're experiencing in your lenses right now, but just help them work less as you go through your day."

The Details:

Biofinity Energys
Replacement Schedule: Monthly
Dk/t: 160
Material: Comfilcon A (silicone hydrogel, same material as Biofinity)
Base Curve: 8.6
Power Ranges: +8.00 to -12.00D (0.50D steps after +/- 6.00D)

I'd love to hear your feedback on the lens! Please comment below if you've tried it out or what your patients are saying!

Want to learn more? Check out my podcast with CooperVision's Dr. Michele Andrews!

A young pediatric patient with significant preseptal cellulitis.  Often this appearance is brought on by a hordeolum (stye). via

Morning talk shows and nightly news segments are abuzz with the promise all Americans over 40 are desperate to hear: "Say So Long To Reading Glasses" and "The End of Reading Glasses" blaze headlines. But before you open your wallet and throw your progressives and drug store reading glasses out the window, let's talk the real science behind what the newly FDA approved presbyopic refractive surgeries can truly accomplish and what they can't.  Many are finding success with these treatments, but only after they have clear expectations for what is possible, what isn't, and what the risks include.

What is Presbyopia?  Around age 40, our eyes begin having difficulty focusing up close.  Looking at books, cell phones, and computers gets more and more difficult with every passing year. This is a completely normal change associated with the aging eye, and no humans are immune.  There is a popular misconception that presbyopia is a weakening of the muscles of the eye, but in fact the muscles are just as strong as they've ever been.  This is why eye exercises or the idea of avoiding glasses wear to "use your eyes" unfortunately won't work.

The lens inside the eye changes shape as the eye muscles contract and release when we change focus, but with time all those layers it accumulates as it grows from year to year add up, and the muscles struggle to get it to adjust its shape. via

The reason we lose our ability to focus at close ranges is because of the lens, a structure of the eye that sits right behind the iris.  The lens changes shape to focus vision near and far, and the muscles of the eye control this movement.  From the day we are born, the lens lays down layers like a tree trunk -- it's one of the only body parts that never stops growing.  Year after year the lens is layering and thickening, and around age 40 it has gotten so thick that it is very difficult for your eye muscles to move and adjust its' shape.  And it just keeps getting thicker every year after, eventually to the point that the muscles can barely move it at all and you would need reading glasses to focus clearly on nearly all close objects.  With today's science we can't thin down the lens to restore flexibility, and if we remove the lens we don't have any artificial lens implants yet that can truly mimic the flexibility of the original.  The presbyopic refractive procedures on the market at this time do not affect the lens at all, but instead try to improve near vision through changing the corneal surface of the eye.  This is important to understand because both the KAMRA and Raindrop procedures available can't give you 20 year old vision again.  The vision will be different from that provided by young, naturally flexible lenses, but if you are prepared for what they can achieve, you may still find success!

The KAMRA Inlay
FDA Approved: April 2015
What It Is: The KAMRA Inlay is a solid dark ring implanted in the cornea in the center of the visual axis (the middle of the pupil) to create a pinhole effect.  The device itself is just 3.8 mm in diameter with a 1.6 mm pinhole in the center for vision.  Due to the optics of a pinhole, objects will appear clear at a range of distances when viewed through such a small "window" because the pinhole blocks light rays that would be entering the eye off angle (which would make things appear blurry). It's the same way a pinhole camera works if you are wanting to learn more. The inlay itself has 84,000 small holes to allow oxygen and nutrient exchange through the inlay to the corneal tissue underneath.

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Who is a Candidate: Age 45 to 60 years old requiring reading glasses between +1.00 and +2.50 in strength.
Who is Not a Candidate: People with cataracts, corneal degenerative conditions (like keratoconus), uncontrolled diabetes, glaucoma, immune system disorders, a history of corneal infections or scarring or dry eye are not candidates.

The Procedure: Only one eye (the nondominant eye) will have the KAMRA inlay placed into the cornea with an outpatient laser procedure, leaving the dominant eye to have clear distance vision. The eye with the inlay will have a range of both distance and near vision, and the untreated eye will only see distance.
The inlay can be removed if there are complications or if vision isn't acceptable, but it is possible that scarring will have occurred where the inlay was placed and vision may be permanently damaged even after removal of the inlay.
The procedure is often coupled with LASIK or PRK to achieve prescription-free distance correction. The inlay eye is ideally left undercorrected at distance by -0.50 to -0.75 D at the time of surgery to improve near function.

FDA Approved: June 2016

• Start your own practice! The best way to have flexibility over your own schedule is to be the boss. As an employed optometrist your schedule is dictated by the doctor or corporation you work for, but when you are working for yourself, you can arrange your hours in the office to best suit your needs.
• Treat your practice like your first child.  Right out of school, Dr. Shen Lee put all of her time, energy, and disposable income back into her practice. The first few years are the hardest and the leanest, but that dedication to the practice in the start lays the foundation for future success.
• Focus on creating patient loyalty by giving patients a reason to come back every year. One of the biggest mistakes Dr. Shen Lee sees practitioners making around the country is letting a patient that isn't complaining or demanding solutions go without getting education for what she can offer.  Even when a patient is successful in a contact lens, she encourages them to try out the newest technology on the market.  Her practice had grown to around 70% daily disposable lens wear because of her dedication to encouraging her patients try out the best lenses on the market, and she's found this technique is a great practice builder.  Her patients come in asking "what's new?" every year because she has focused on building loyalty and value in her exams. 
• How does she balance home and work life? “Instead of telling you what I do, let me tell you what I don’t do.  I don’t do dishes; I don’t do laundry.” She spends her precious time at home being present and active in the lives of her family and loved ones, helping with homework, trekking to fencing lessons and tournaments with her daughters,and  just being a mom and mentor to her children.   Getting help for the day to day chores that can steal away precious time is essential for her to have the time to explore her passions in optometry and as a mom and wife.

Can I rewind myself in time and start over as a member of Gamma Omicron at my alma mater, the Southern College of Optometry? I'm not saying I want to go back to school, or that I haven't enjoyed the last 5 years seeing patients and you know, getting paid to do so. But today's generation of future female ODs isn't messing around.  They've seen the statistics on the 16% gender starting salary gap for new graduates in our profession and while most of their classmates are women (67% of all enrolled optometry students were female in the 2015-2016 calendar school year), they noticed some overt discrepancies.  When asked, Sandy Trybus (SCO '17) says she cofounded Gamma Omicron on campus when she began realizing none of the successful doctors brought back to speak on campus were women.  Where were her female optometric role models and mentors? Women that could help her and her classmates navigate the issues that they would disproportionately face as they graduated and began searching for job opportunities and navigating establishing leadership and authority in their relationships with employers, staff, and patients? Where were the people like her that were success stories and leaders in our profession? She and cofounder Michelle Moscow set out to bring more female voices on campus by giving them a place all their own.

Head over to the Defocus Podcast for the full interview!!

Gamma Omicron was once a club on campus at SCO back in the 70s, when just a small subset of the student body was female.  At that time, female students at SCO felt they needed a place where they could establish their own leadership and autonomy in a historically male dominated profession.  As female enrollment continued to grow, the club eventually fell out of existence as class sizes became more equally split and equality in the classroom and workplace became less of an exception than a rule in the general public. 40 years later, Trybus and Moscow were looking for a place to focus on women leaders in the profession to help mentor themselves and fellow classmates and came upon Gamma Omicron in old yearbooks.  It was a perfect fit to re-establish the club that had lovingly drawn it's greek letters from "Girls Only."

Gamma Omicron members speak with Dr. Brigitte Keener (SCO '11) at their annual speed-learning event

Over the past month I've had the privilege of speaking with Trybus, and new club leaders Julia Hamm and Maddie Coughlin via the latest Defocus Media podcast, and then to the entire Gamma Omicron club as a speaker at their first 2016-17 school year meeting to talk salary and contract negotiations, and navigating difficulties young women often face in staff, employer, and patient interactions. Our discussions have yielded so many great talking points I wanted to share some pearls with you ladies that might not yet have a Gamma Omicron chapter established at your school:

• When applying for a job, how can you negotiate if you haven't really had any experience?  My recommendation is to think outside the box; you may not be an expert in patient care by the numbers, but I bet you're an expert in something your hiring doctor is not.  Look at their practice: are they offering specialty contact lenses, vision therapy or sports vision, infant and pediatric care, or dry eye specialties?  These are all buzzword specialties in optometry that older doctors may not be personally interested in training on, but would love to bring into their practice through you.  Look at their social media: is their website a mess? Facebook underutilized? Are they even online at all? Taking over social media marketing is a great way to bring instant value, and your hiring doctor will not question your generational expertise in this area. For more negotiating tips head here.
• But hold your horses, because bringing value to a practice is great, but you need to make sure you and the hiring doctor are on the same page about your future.  When we first spoke on the podcast, I was surprised to hear that putting a date on when to begin buying in to a practice at the initial contract signing wasn't a top priority for students.  It's true that you want to try out the practice first before you commit, but many friends and good doctors before and after me have fallen into this trap.  If you don't set a date to begin buy-in negotiations, then the day will somehow never magically come.  Five years later you're still waiting to have that conversation and the doctor you work for still thinks you might not be ready to take on the leadership and commitment of being a full partner because you're about to start a family or you're still growing into the position.  That's 5 years of blood, sweat, and tears you've put into that practice that you will eventually have to buy back from yourself, because every day you've worked there you've grown the business patient encounter by patient encounter.  I highly recommend setting a 1 year from hire date to get the practice evaluated by an outside party and to begin buy-in discussions.  Doctors love their practices and those in the baby boomer generation have universally seemed reluctant to walk away or retire, so they often put off handing over the reigns to their practice even after bringing you on board with the mindset to do just that.  Help keep the ball moving in that direction by getting firm plans set in stone for buy-in discussions right from the start.
• "You look like you just graduated high school" or "when's the doctor coming in?" are questions these ladies will likely be asked as new docs (and 5 years later, yes I'm still getting them).  The best medicine is laughter in these situations - I always laugh a little and say something to the effect of "Oh thank you so much! My wrinkle cream must be working!" with a genuine smile like I truly appreciate the compliment.  Yes, I know patients who criticize our appearance as too youthful aren't complimenting my wrinkle-free skin, but they are telling me with those comments that they feel anxious or concerned that my level of care might not be up to par. Th best way to alleviate fear is to help get the patient smiling or laughing with you on the other side.  If I smile and laugh, they will smile and laugh, and it's hard to feel anxious when you're smiling so much!

While new scientific advancements have revolutionized treatment and even cured some systemic diseases in recent years, blinding eye conditions have remained stubbornly difficult to treat.  For many, a diagnosis of severe vision loss or blindness is a forever diagnosis, with no cure or treatment possible. Full thickness macular hole was once a medical condition that held little to no hope; the macula is the central vision area critical for fine detail sight and while a complete hole in the tissue is rare (studies show around 0.09% of the population will develop a macular hole in their lifetime), the visual prognosis is very poor.  Only about 5% of patients with full thickness macular hole will have vision of 20/50 or better, and 40% of patients will be worse then 20/200 in the affected eye (the criteria for legal blindness if both eyes are affected).  But new innovations in macular hole repair may be making these numbers a thing of the past.

A large full thickness macular hole as seen on retinal fundus imaging (above) and OCT imaging (below) via

What is a Macular Hole
Macular holes can be caused by a number of different factors, both genetic, trauma related, and purely aging related. The inside of the eye is filled with a gel-like substance called the vitreous, and one of the places that this gel attaches most strongly is at the very middle of our central vision area called the macula.  Whether from high prescriptions stretching the eye too thin, trauma causing sudden disruption, or just the normal aging process, the vitreous gel naturally begins to separate from the back of the eye with the passage of time (called posterior vitreous detachment).  As this separation of the vitreous from the retina happens, sometimes the vitreous stays attached right at the central macula (or fovea), pulling the retinal cells of the macular region up and off with it. There are various stages of macular holes as the tissue is lifted up and away, but in full thickness macular holes an entire area of retinal cells are missing at the macula, causing a bling spot in that vital area of central vision.

Macular holes often begin with simple traction; the vitreous gel that fills the eye attaches more strongly at the central macular area, so when it begins to pull away from the eye due to trauma or age, it may stay attached at the macula and beginning lifting the retinal tissue up and away with it.  This is termed vitreomacular traction.  via

In some, the traction on the macula does not release, and the separating vitreous pulls the macular tissue off with it, leaving a hole in the retina underneath.  This hole will not self-repair, and since the macula is the central vision area, a missing plug of retina tissue at this vital spot is usually devastating to vision. via

New Techniques
Traditional treatment for macular holes was limited; studies showed holes older than 6 months in age or larger than 400 microns were unlikely to benefit from macular hole repair.  The technique was difficult for both doctor and patient. The doctor would remove all of the vitreous from inside the eye (called vitrectomy), then painstakingly peel away the layer of cells right on top of the retina (called the ILM or internal limiting membrane) with fine tipped forceps. Then the patient's eye was filled with a gas bubble and the patient would lie face down in a specific position to hold the gas bubble properly in place over the macular hole for a period of days to weeks. Unfortunately, larger or older holes didn't respond well even to these aggressive approaches, with only 47% of holes that were 1 year or older closing after surgery.

New treatments have been showing promise in repairing larger and older macular holes, however. In 2010 researchers reported a new technique for repairing large macular holes (400 microns or more). Instead of fully peeling away the ILM, researchers folded the tissue back and made a little flap of ILM right over the are of the macular hole. Gas bubble positioning was performed followed by 3-4 days of head down positioning, and the results were impressive: 98% of large macular holes were repaired with the ILM flap approach (compared to only 88% repaired in traditional methods).  It is unknown why the ILM helps support macular hole closure, but doctors theorize that the basement membrane properties of the ILM supports abundant glial cells growth, and photoreceptors in surrounding areas of reitna are drawn towards the glial cells and begin filling in the macular hole.

A. A 68 year old with large macular hole and 20/80 vision;  B. 3 months post-ILM flap technique, the macular hole is repaired and vision improved to 20/30 via

The most difficult macular holes to repair, with low success rates even with ILM flap procedures, are those associated with high myopia and posterior staphyloma. With significantly high prescriptions (typically -8.00 or higher), the retina is so elongated that the retinal tissue is stretched dangerously thin across the back of the eye.  These patients are at a much higher risk of retinal detachments and even splitting of the retina right at the central area, an event called foveoschisis. There is so much tractional force on the retina from these severely elongated eyes that the macular holes associated are often massively large and resistant to closure by even the most advanced techniques. In a brand new surgical technique described by Dr. Dilraj Grewal and Dr. Tamer Mahmoud in June 2016, there is hope of a breakthrough.  Doctors Grewal and Mahmoud treated a -15.00D myopic woman with 1100 micron macular hole that had previously failed repair from traditional technique with ILM peel and vitrectomy.  Because the ILM was already removed (and with the size of the macular hole involved an ILM flap would have had very little chance of closure), the doctors instead removed an appropriately sized wedge of peripheral retinal tissue and laser barricaded around this area to prevent retinal detachment, then placed this wedge of retina to "plug" the macular hole. This procedure has been termed autologous retinal transplant, using the patient's own retina to patch the area of the macular hole, and this was the first of its kind in human case study. OCT imaging 3 months after surgery showed closure of the macular hole and improvement in vision from 20/200 prior to surgery to 20/80 at the last reported follow-up.

Drs. Grewal and Mahmoud operated on a longstanding 1100 micron macular hole (seen in preop above) by transplanting a flap of retina from the periphery.  At 3 months post-op OCT imaging shows complete closure of the macular hole, and at 7 months post-op there is continued improvement as the retinal layers continue to thicken and the flap integrates into the surrounding macular tissue. via

With these exciting new innovations, there is hope for macular hole closure and at least some improvement to vision even in large and longstanding macular holes that have failed previous treatment.  If you have a patient that has resigned themselves to untreatable vision loss, there is reason to hope that these new innovations in macular hole repair can help!

When you're a parent, nothing breaks your heart more than seeing your child in distress. Between the normal range of infections and viruses that can cause conjunctivitis in infants (commonly termed "pink eye") and the fact that as many as 20% of children are born with congenital nasolacrimal duct obstruction (blocked tear ducts), the chance of having to battle red, goopy eyes in infancy is high.  Dr. Sarah Sweeney Dorhman is a new mother and optometrist, and experienced this common issue first hand when her daughter began suffering from chronic irritation and mattering discharge due to nasolacrimal duct obstruction.  She shares her experience, and what you can do at home to help your own child battle ocular irritation.

One thing that hasn't been associated with eyewear for a while: "Made in America."  For decades eyewear design and manufacture has been split into 2 realms: luxury craftmanship in European markets like Italy or France, versus low cost, mass produced frames made in high production markets like China. American eyewear designers were plentiful, but actual frame production was always sent overseas.  Through the early 2000s, many American industrial cities were plummeting into economic crisis as manufacturing jobs continued to rush off shore to drive down production costs.  But there were many in the world of optical that wanted to move manufacturing back stateside. Enter the team behind  STATE Optical Co. - the first luxury eyewear brand to be designed and manufactured in the USA.


How did STATE Optical turn the tide?  In 1977 Alan and Cynthia Shapiro founded Europa, an industry leading eyewear company out of their garage.  Fast forward to 2011 when their son, Scott Shapiro began working with Europa president Jerry Wolowicz on ways to bring producation of acetate eyewear to the US.  They had the will, but they needed someone with the know how and craftmanship expertise to actually manufacture luxury eyewear - rare to find in the US since the industry had been international for so many years. They teamed up with the improbable pair of cousins Marc Franchi and Jason Staley -- men with a history of working primarily in the automotive field that had a passion for making things with their hands. When they learned so few eyeglasses were made in the US, they started learning the trade on their own.  "Of course everyone told them they were crazy, and that the idea wasn't economically feasible," says Scott Shapiro.  

Franchi and Staley learned eyewear manufacturing from the ground up, touring manufacturing facilities overseas and observing craftsmen at work.  "They literally taught themselves how to produce acetate eyewear," marvels Shapiro.  Shapiro and Wolowicz were first introduced to the cousins when they came across their original made in America eyewear, "Frieze Frames."  They were wowed by the quality of the frames, unparalleled in the small American eyewear market. The partnership was born: the cousins and now 45 additional highly skilled eyewear craftsmen now produce frames out of the state-of-the-art Chicago home of State Optical Co. 

The Process

Blake Kuwahara is the lauded American eyewear designer behind his popular eponymous frame line and a recent capsule collection with l.a. Eyeworks to name a few

"Part of our vision for building this factory was that optical professionals and eyewear lovers from around the country could come to our facility and see how frames are made. When you buy a pair of STATE frames and open the case, you’ll see the statement, “come see how your frames are made”. Our factory is open to the public. Anyone can make an appointment for a factory tour right from our website, STATEopticalco.com."

Each STATE Optical Co design features a pyramid of 21 drill dots reminiscent of the stars on the United States flag to represent Illinois, the 21st state of the union.

STATE Optical Co. is very new to the market, but already having a big impact. "We soft-launched the collection at Vision Expo West in 2015 and attracted a lot of attention. That was literally the first time anyone outside our company had seen any of the frames. We showed it again at Vision Expo East and were mostly booked the entire weekend."

"Our major focus right now is just on continuing to increase the capacity of our factory, and Marc and Jason are continuing to train our craftsmen to perfect these long-lost skills. As we achieve that, we will be able to take on some of the other wild endeavors we have on our white board. As for now, we’re preparing to make 2017 a very big year for STATE Optical Co."

Check out the entire collection on their website and get sneak peaks into the manufacturing process and the detailed hand-craftmanship behind each frame on their Instagram account.