Sunglasses: A Cultural & Functional History
Sunglasses Through Years Are As Much a Symbol of Fashion and Celebrity as They Are UV Protection
As more and more celebrities wear sunglasses in an attempt to ‘hide’ from the paparazzi, sunglasses have become an actual symbol of celebrity. And in our contemporary society, anything associated with celebrity or wealth is fashionable
— Lucy Collins, instructor at Parsons The New School for Design and LIM College
If the eyes are the window to the soul, sunglasses might be the door to the world of celebrity style. From James Dean’s iconic Ray-Ban Wayfarers in "Rebel Without a Cause" to Tom Cruise’s gold-rimmed Ray-Ban Aviators in "Top Gun," sunglasses have become synonymous with fame. Their history stretches over 80 years, from the introduction as practical, protective eyewear to a point at which they are considered essential elements of style.
American businessman Sam Foster was the first to establish mass-produced and inexpensive sunglasses in 1929, and soon began marketing them on the boardwalk in Atlantic City, New Jersey. By 1930, they were all the rage, worn by movie stars and common folk from Hollywood to the Hamptons.
Sunglasses have never fallen far out of favor.
When looking at many photographs of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis taken in the 1960s and early 1970s, the eyes are drawn to her glamorous, oversized sunglasses. Nearly half a century later, sunglasses remain key fashion accessories that help to define the wearer's image.
No one has to tell Lucy Collins that when it comes to sunglasses, some people think style over substance — or sense.
“Recently I was on a subway train, at night, and a woman was wearing her shades,” said Collins, an instructor in fashion theory and fashion ethics courses at Parsons The New School for Design and LIM College, both in New York City. “It obviously wasn’t to keep the sun out of her eyes.”
Sunglasses were once just functional items people wore to help them see in bright sunlight. That has changed. Collins said they now create a certain kind of “invisibility,” adding an element of mystique to the person behind the darkened lenses.
“When you can’t see a person’s eyes, you are intrigued and seduced in a way,” she said. “They are a kind of a mask. They seem to imply a desire to deceive, or at least to appear slightly ‘unreadable.’”
It’s no wonder that big screen stars resort to sunglasses in an (mostly vain) effort to dodge the camera-wielding shutterbugs that conspire to track their every waking move.
“We associate sunglasses with celebrity mainly because of the prevalence of the paparazzi,” Collins said. “As more and more celebrities wear sunglasses in an attempt to ‘hide’ from the paparazzi, sunglasses have become an actual symbol of celebrity. And in our contemporary society, anything associated with celebrity or wealth is fashionable."
If you can’t be as cool as Jack Nicholson, who regularly sports his Wayfarers at L.A. Lakers games, you can at least wear the same sunglasses. In 1983, the year that Cruise wore Wayfarers in "Risky Business," Ray-Ban reportedly sold 360,000 pairs of the high-profile sunglasses. The style is in serious revival mode in 2011, worn by everybody from Drew Barrymore to supermodel Kate Moss.
“Sunglasses are essentially a status symbol,” Collins said.
Joseph Sugarman is the founder of BluBlocker sunglasses. Thanks to a series of popular 1980s infomercials, the company sold 20,000 million pairs of BluBlockers in a six-year period. Sugarman said it's a recent development that consumers give a dang about what sunglasses actually do instead of how they look.
“Prior to the late 1980s, the general public wasn’t educated about the dangers of the sun’s ultra violet rays and that they can cause skin cancer,” Sugarman said. “Since then, companies have refined their production facilities to make safer sunglasses.”
All the same, sunglasses’ potential optical health benefits lag a distant second behind whatever sort of image they convey. Think John Lennon's rounded psychedelic tea shades from the late 1960s.
“Sunglasses make a huge fashion statement in our culture,” Sugarman said. “And movies play a big role in making people a lot more aware of what sunglasses are on trend.”
To wit, BluBlockers experienced a huge boost in sales in October 2009 after Zach Galifianakis wore them in the box office smash "The Hangover."
“In fashion, trends are always changing,” Sugarman said. “Ten years ago, the trend was small frames; now the trend is big. All across the board large sunglasses are popular. We need to keep up with those trends, no matter what the product, in order to keep on selling.”
Ultimately, Collins said, our obsession with sunglasses stems from a yearning to adopt our own collective air of mystery. Just like the high-profile movie stars whose style we seek to emulate.
“Like many objects of fashion, how we interpret sunglasses is now very far removed from their actual function,” says Collins. “They imply much more — most of which depends on the allure of the unknown.”
- Photo Credit Christian Petersen/Getty Images Sport/Getty Images
