Veronik 014

Silhouette from Austria was a top brand during the 1970's and 1980's, in my opinion only rivaled by the famous house of Christian Dior who brought a revolution to the world of fashion when they launched their first series of glasses in 1976. Until then, Swiss ladies tended to be rather conservative in their frame choice. But within weeks, the streets of the Montreux area were full of beautiful girls and ladies sporting the bold yet classy Christian Dior glasses. Those were the days.... By contrast, the rise to fame by Silhouette was more gradual. They started way back in 1964 on a fairly modest scale and their international breakthrough took place during the early and mid 1970's. Silhouette is still going strong and they made some remarkable choices over the years. For one, they were reluctant to switch to the tiny retro frames that put an end to the golden decades of  eyewear design in 1988 / 1989. Silhouette continued to design and manufacture frames with at least an echo of the 1980's until 1998. They then decided to focus entirely on discrete rimless frames, creating yet another niche for themselves. But let's go back to the golden decades. Silhouette kindly met my request to supply the year of manufacture to the serial numbers of two dozen glasses in my collection. The pair shown here by lovely Veronik is part of a bestseller series for Silhouette in 1984. The frame 1156 came in at least five different colors and my collection hosts a dozen examples - purple, dark brown, transparent and so on. I always assumed that the large, airy frame was suitable for mild prescriptions only. However, the pale brown pair shown by Veronik proves otherwise. These glasses were recently sent to me by Mike who was my guide in Sussex last year and also fulfilled the role of second photographer during the photo shoot with international deejay and model Nicci Infinity in Brighton. Thank you, Mike! Needless to say, these glasses were used straightaway during a photo shoot in my home town some weeks ago (this shoot will be posted soon) and they also traveled with me to Switzerland last week. Veronik did not need any persuasion from my side to give them a try, so she has the scoop. If my memory serves me correctly, the large tree in the background was planted during the revolution of 1798.