For me Persol, like many luxury brands, has always had an air of mystique behind it. It commands a very high price point in a cluttered sunglass market and yet I always seem to find myself drooling over the latest frame designs whenever I’m at the airport.
Is it the range of frames or the quality lenses or is it just the fact the brand has been built up over the years by premium celebrity tie-ups? Steve McQueen popularised the 714 folding model in the original Thomas Crown Affair, and subsequently Pierce Brosnan & Daniel Craig have both sported many pairs in their roles as James Bond.
But I think the richest experience I have had with the brand is this video. Persol prides itself as being “hand made in italy” and you often loose sight of the origin of words particularly in a world of marketing jargon and clever copy that massages the truth around brands. But this video really helped bring it back to basics. Yes you need the high profile celebs to build the credibility, yes you need the film endorsements to propel the brands luxury values, yet “hand-made” suggests a craft and that care & attention have been inject into the construction of the product – so its nice to see a brand getting back to basics and providing that look into the “reason to believe” they’re worth the price tag.
For me its this authentic view into the construction of product which has made them that ever-so slightly more justifiable…after all I won’t be telling my friends that “Daniel Craig wore them” I’ll be saying “they’re hand-made, don’t you know!!”
Persol – The Magnificent Obsession of Hand Making Persol
