Fashion Spectacles, Spectacular Fashion: Eyewear Styles and Shapes from Vintage to 2020

“. . . [a] delectable aesthetic experience that will no doubt be treasured by its readers, no matter their fashion exposure or expertise.”

Fashion Spectacles, Spectacular Fashion is indeed spectacular considering the effort required to catalog a private collection of this magnitude. The quality and quantity of eyeglasses amassed by Mr. Murray in this collection is certainly one of the most exhaustive and encyclopedic—but not necessarily the most inclusive of its kind.

While the text is informative, there are some obvious brand and designer omissions, especially when one considers the major role eyewear fashion has assumed within the last 10 years.

One would be considered remiss to have left out “players” such as Warby Parker, Oliver Peoples, Colors in Optics, the eponymous collection of Alain Mikli, and lastly the mega giant Luxottica. These are the “players” that helped form and continuously bolster the importance of eyewear in the latter part of the 20th century. These are the names of the future—and yet they are nearly completely absent here with only a few mentioned in passing.

As far as the quality of this undertaking, the book is beautifully and clearly photographed with generous sized four-color photos of the styles making up the collection. The presentation, in toto, is beyond criticism, as are the historical tidbits and writing style. The only quibble is the collection is somewhat sparse in spectacles from the 1980s until the present.

From a strictly fashion point of view, Fashion Spectacles, Spectacular Fashion is a book for spec lovers and surely for those who are hungry to learn about an industry, that is, by all standards, is in its infancy given its popularity as an accessory is barely over a century old.

Mr. Murray and Mr. Albrechtsten offer an educational and delectable aesthetic experience that will no doubt be treasured by its readers, no matter their fashion exposure or expertise.