Sunglasses • Brief Histories of Fashion Houses • Fun Facts!

Shades of Fun! Novelty Sunglasses

Entry page for our Fashion Sunglasses History Pages

This is one of our favorite pages! You see here at Shades of Fun, we live in the world of wacky funky crazy kooky novelty sunglasses. You know, sunglasses shaped like a pair of lips, or party sunglasses shaped like a beer mug . . . OK, if you are a fashionista, then you probably don't know about the world of novelty sunglasses, so just have a peek at the photo on the right! That is what a novelty sunglass looks like!

All the world loves a good story and we found a lot of them when we set about to write the history of the great fashion houses of the world. Like the fact that Mario Prada had a personal policy of never letting the female members of his family into his work area. Now that is funny because his business only succeeded into the 21st Century because the women in his family put it into the stratosphere!

We knew ahead of time that Donna Karan was a celebrity, but we did not know that Maui Jim was a parrot!

We did not know that the California-based Costa del Mar Sunglass company has a big patriotic streak. Each year they treat military veterans to a day on the water fishing by sponsoring The American Veterans Fish Off in Florida. That makes us like them more!

We didn't know that the folks who make Police Sunglasses also have a line named Sting, but is the musician connected to the company? No! Antonio Banderas, George Clooney and David Beckham are, but not Sting.

We did not realize how many current fashion designers had their apprentices working under so many other fashion designers. What a world, so full of minefields! A quick example is that Yves St Laurent labored under Christian Dior in France.

We could not have imagined that a single pair of sunglasses were sold at auction for over $70,000 US! Imagine! They belonged to the American movie actor Steve McQueen, but you will have to read our article to find out who was the manufacturer!

	We did not know that the Oakley Sunglasses company was named after the owner's dog! You'll have t read the article to find out what breed of dog that "Oakley" was. You'll never guess.	We did not know that at one time the owner of Oakley, Jim Jannard was friends with one of the founders of Nike, Phil Knight. They are not friends now, we hear. We don't write about that in our article, but you can look around yourself to find out about it if it interests you.
Because here we do not live in the high fashion world, remember, we are the kings of cheap sunglasses, we did not know how young and handsome Kenneth Cole is! Or that he has a huge philanthropic streak. Click his picture to read more. On that page, there is a great story about how he started the company!	Gucci's pink sunglasses

You hear names of companies all the time, fashion houses included, but unless you are in the fashion industry or follow the high fashion worlds of Paris, Milan, London, Madrid or New York, you may not be familiar with the real people behind the names of the companies. Pictured below are the real guys behind Dolce & Gabbana.

Because of pop culture, Donna Versace is fairly easily identified by a lot of people, but they guys like Dolce & Gabbana, not so much. Unless you are over 50 or 60 years of ago, you probably can't identify Valentino either.

We loved finding out about Hobie Alter, the California boy who started the world of the Hobie Cat from his Dad's garage. Those who are in his world know his story well and many, many, many of them participate in his company's world of races and regattas.

The story of the Burberry family and their roots to the British military is fascinating. Love their plaid, love their story!


We think a lot of people who used to know that Jean Vuarnet founded the Vuarnet sunglasses line don't know that he launched the brand the same year (1960) he won the Gold Medal in Downhill Skiing at the Olympics in Squaw Valley, Utah. That would put him at the very front of the line of fashion sunglasses innovators of the 20th Century.	We didn't know there were so many sport sunglasses options offering polarized lenses. We also did not know that in addition to UV protection, polarized lenses also make you less tired when you are out on the water. With polarized sunglasses, the eye does not have to work as hard to see, so you, the owner of the eyeballs, keeps all your energy for the after-fishing party! Companies like Arnette market to teens and young adults. We didn't know that boarding was so popular.	We knew that Ralph Lauren was born and raised in the Bronx, but in our research we discovered the very little known fact that President John F Kennedy, the man whose legacy is so closely tied to Massachusetts, spent his early years in the Bronx as well. In 1960, JFK admitted to a local crowd that he was a Bronxite, too!

We learned that Calvin Klein is not owned by Calvin Klein anymore. He sold it to the Phillips-Van Heusen Corporation. The Phillips Van Heusen corporation (PVH) has a ton of wonderful historical stories about the companies it has acquired. Some of these include Bass, Lacoste and of course, the Van Heusen company. We also didn't know the stock traded on the stock exchange and is doing very well!	We discovered that the Sunglass Hut is part of the Luxottica Group, which is an enormous conglomerate of designer sunglass designs, optical eyewear collections and retail stores including LensCrafters and EyeMed. They also trade on the stock exchange under the stock symbol LUX. From Serengeti, we learned that Monel is the most widely used material in the industry that is an alloy of nickel and copper. With our kooky sunglasses made out of plastic, we never had to know that!	John F. Kennedy grew up in The Bronx in the late 1920s when his father was a Wall Street speculator. He lived in Riverdale on 252nd Street and Independence Avenue and attended the Riverdale Country School. When he was running for President in 1960, at a big rally on the Grand Concourse and Fordham Road, he admitted that he came from The Bronx.

Cartier started off as a jeweler. The namesake Cartier's son was sent from Paris to London where the son caught the attention of the soon-to-be crowned King of England, Edward VII. That's how Cartier began to spread its wings outside of France.

The Bulgari company is also known as one of the top jewelry designers in the world. They are thought of as an Italian company, but the founder of the company was actually a silversmith from Greece!

There are so many things we didn't know about the fashion industry, you wonder if there was anything we did know when we set about to write the history of the fashion house sunglasses . . . OK, we didn't know anything.

Byblos sunglasses entered the marketplace in the early 1970s. We did not know that Gianni Versace was the lines first designer! The company that manufactures them recently opened up a beautifully restored Italian villa as a hotel, spa and art installation called the Byblos Art Hotel outside Verona, Italy. Visit the website link, it's beautiful!

We knew about the little Chanel suit for the women and we knew about the perfume, Chanel No. 5, but we did not know that Coco Chanel fell in love with a Nazi officer and left France for Switzerland for the war years. Her post-World War II reputation suffered for some years but she was able to eventually recover her brand. Imagine if she had pulled off a stunt like the Nazi affair in today's bright celebrity lights!

We didn't know that Jean Paul Gaultier had designed the costumes for so many movies! He's so versatile.

We didn't know that Giorgio Armani was an apprentice under Nino Cerruti. Or that Donna Karan apprenticed under Ann Klein.

We loved it when we discovered that the Fendi company paid a whimsical tribute to the equestrian buckle along the sidepiece of one of their styles of designer sunglasses. That is so us! Except for the price . . . most of our sunglasses are about $12 each! Even our cheap Ray Ban sunglasses are just $12 per dozen.

Looking surprisingly stylish, Yoko Ono attends Elton John's 60th birthday party!

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Gianni Versace Sunglasses	Olympic Sunglasses	Wiley X Sunglasses	French Designer Sunglasses
Anarchy Sunglasses	Ralph Lauren Sunglasses	Arnette Sunglasses	Aviator Sunglasses
Baby Phat Sunglasses	Beach Bikini Sunglasses	Après Ski Bolle Sunglasses	Burberry Fashion Sunglasses
Bulgari’s Expensive Sunglasses	Donna Karan Fashion Sunglasses	Dolce Gabbana Sunglasses	Dragon Alliance Sunglasses
Fendi Buckle Sunglasses	Gargoyle Sunglasses	Giorgio Armani Sunglasses	Gucci Family Fashion Sunglasses
Sports Polarized Sunglasses	Hobie Alter Sunglasses	Gaultier Sunglasses	Kenneth Cole Sunglasses
Matrix Sunglasses	Maui Jim Sunglasses	Nike Swoosh Sunglasses	Oakley Sunglasses
Persol James Bond Sunglasses	Polarized Sunglasses	Police Sunglasses	Prada Sunglasses
Ralph Lauren Sunglasses	Wayfarer Ray Ban Sunglasses	Revo Sunglasses	Robert Cavalli Sunglasses
Serengeti Sunglasses	Silhouette Sunglasses	Smith Sunglasses	Sunglasses Hut
Tommy Hilfiger Sunglasses	Valentino Designer Sunglasses	Briko Sunglasses	Byblos Sunglasses
Calvin Klein Sunglasses	Carrera Sunglasses	Cartier Sunglasses	Chanel Sunglasses
Christian Dior Sunglasses	Costa Del Mar Sunglasses	Diesel Sunglasses	Discount Sunglasses
Dolce Gabbana Sunglasses	Fendi Sunglasses	Giorgio Armani Sunglasses	Gucci Sunglasses

Breaking Sunglasses News:

Did you know there are now Bluetooth Sunglasses? Yes! Released by a company named Inter Brands, they have 100 minutes of standby time, talk time up to 5 hours. The receiver would combine with the sunglasses and if you don't want to wear the sunglasses then you could take it out as the decoration. The Bluetooth receiver could be used for MP3, laptop, desktop computer, cell phone and the skype.

One Hit Wonder or Mogul in Training? Soulja Boy may have rapped about getting F's in school, but since he's become a celeb, the young'un has obviously acquired knowledge in economics. He has a full blitz tied into his new album. In addition to the CD he is about to release, comes "Soulja Boy Sunglasses", his own signature shoes called Yums, as well as a cartoon titled "Bad Little Homies" about him and his friends. "Crank That" started this young man's wheels crankin!

Did you know that rapper/hip hop artist Kanye West is performing in April 2008 and May throughout the USA? Here are some of the current concert locations: Las Vegas at the Red Rock Casino Resort Spa, Albuquerque, New Mexico at the Journal Pavilion, Denver, Colorado at the Pepsi Center, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma at the Ford Center, Austin, Texas at the Frank Irwin Center, Dallas, Texas at the Superpages.com Center [that's a weird name] and in Houston, Texas at the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion. We offer the white slotted glasses that he made famous in this Stronger video. We call them Kanye West Shutter Shades.

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