As eyewear enthusiasts, we love it when our favorite designers come to visit. So you can imagine our excitement when Tommy O’Gara, “the Man behind some of the world’s best Eyewear” came all the way from Japan to talk shop with Dan Deutsch at our Sunset Plaza boutique. Tommy is the director of The Light Company, which manufactures eyewear for the brands Native Sons, Shady Character, Sauvage and most recently Max Pittion. He was witty and charming, and extremely passionate about eyewear.
Impromptu Interview
Dan could’t pass up the opportunity to take out his phone and record a video. Tommy used the occasion to introduce his brand Native Sons.
Transcript:
Hi I’m Tommy O’gara, I’m here visiting Dan Deutsch, from Japan. I’m the director of the Light Company. We have a brand called Native Sons we’re looking at today.
Native Sons is designed by us. It’s made in our own factory in Sabae. It’s very vertical. We can go from from design to prototype in 20 days. So we do a lot of experimentation. And I’d like to show you the Engineering collection a little bit and the Craftline collection.
The engineering collection is marked by these beauty marks. And this is a frame called the Cornell. We use only Takiron materials which are cellulose based. They’re better for the planet, better for your skin. They’re harder, deeper, richer. And we have a special system of tumbling. We created a tumbling system called Spirogara, which polishes actually the front at the same time, whereas 90 degree tumbling just takes the edges. That’s why the Takiron materials are key, because they’re much harder…The Cornell is a large, meaty Wellington. It looks fabulous. This is called Honey Tortoise… OK. So we do acetate, metals, combinations. We could shift over to say… the Matheson.
The Matheson — it’s a timeless frame! I mean, it’s got 3D carving. This color is called gasoline. Again, the beauty marks. We have the scooped arrow hinge, and we also use the star nut.
The star nut is to tune the hinge. It was used in the 80s and early 90s in Japan, and the Japanese designers discarded it as being sort of “not needed”. But the truth is, the star nut hinge configuration, for opticians, is really premium. It’s really a great way to tune the hinges.
So, we’re looking forward to introducing these to Hollywood and of course Dan. And I’m really, really happy to be here.
Tommy: If I’m out rolling, I’ll put on the Kowalski acetate frame. I have one color we call “blood”. . I really wanted, not a red, but a deep, burnt wine. So, one night I just poked my finger and it bled on the paper, and I photographed it while it was drying because, you know, blood will go from bright red to like a burnt brown. And I peeked it just before the burnt brown — really amazing color.
Dan: The things we have to do to create!
Tommy: Well, yeah, I probably wouldn’t have done that if I wasn’t looking for the color, but you’re right. It didn’t hurt much. Yeah, I mean I’m really inspired by nature when it comes to color, you know. And starting to look toward space, actually. There’s some amazing colors and hues that they can take with the Hubble space craft now, you know. Colors you never saw before in your life, on earth! Not exactly, anyway, you know? I mean I grew up in the 70s, so, you know, we experimented with everything.
The conversation continues
Tommy and Dan spent the next few hours talking all things eyewear. Tommy shared his inspirations for his latest collection, the challenges he faced while designing it, and his vision for the future of eyewear. You can listen to more of the conversation in the video, below.
Tommy’s commitment to sustainability was evident in our conversation. He spoke about his passion for creating eyewear that was both stylish and environmentally conscious. He told us about how the material is conserved by the way they are cut, and how the off-cuts are decomposed without harmful gases.
If you want to biodegrade these — you can biodegrade them. But if you don’t want to, they are going to last longer than anything.
Meeting eyewear legend Tommy O’gara was an experience that we will always remember. We look forward to the next visit, and until then will continue to be inspired by Tommy’s dedication to creating unique, high-quality, and sustainable eyewear.
Transcript:
DAN DEUTSCH: So this is it?
TOMMY O’GARA: Well, it’s just a spattering, really.
DAN: So listen, what I kinda like about this—from my point of view—is that it’s not so thin. It has some kind of flavor to it.
TOMMY: Yeah, thank you. I mean, we generally start with 6mm acetate, and on some of the finer ones we carve it down to 5.5mm. Then we’re carving the skiving and the scooping. Oh—we have some interesting factory videos we can share with you too.
DAN: Yeah, please do.
But yeah, these are very pretty. I like the colors.
TOMMY: I think seeing the Spirogara is interesting because it’s so common, you know?
Oh, I love the [Native Sons] Matheson. The Matheson is what I call a beanie frame. It looks so good with a beanie on, you know? [laughs]
DAN: Long as I have you here, I have a question for you. Looking at these frames over here…
TOMMY: Can I touch it?
DAN: Oh yeah. So what I’m trying to show you is—how do they combine this color and that color?
TOMMY: It’s not combined. It’s… when the sheet is made—okay, do you have a piece of paper? No? Okay. The sheet is, say, 240 x 640 millimeters, right? Well, the top and bottom would have the pattern and the middle would be clear. So they’re cutting one row like this and the other like this. That’s how the sheet is actually made.
DAN: ’Cause I thought it was connected with UV or something like that.
TOMMY: No, no. You can see the Takiron Golan—the SKU number is TN. Well, there are a few different ones. But that’s how it’s made.
DAN: And you, yourself—you prefer to wear metal frames or plastic frames?
TOMMY: I wear both. It depends. If I’m working—like I’m in design mode and on the computer for 2 or 3 days straight—I’ll wear a titanium frame because it doesn’t tire me out. If I’m out rolling, I’ll put on the… I wear the Kowalski acetate frame. I have one color we call “blood.” I really wanted—not a red—but a deep, burnt wine. So one night I just poked my finger and it bled on the paper, and I photographed it while it was drying. Because, you know, blood will go from bright red to like a burnt brown, and I peeked it just before the burnt brown—really amazing color.
DAN: The things we have to do to create!
ALL: [laughing]
TOMMY: Well, yeah, I probably wouldn’t have done that if I wasn’t looking for the color. But you’re right—it didn’t hurt much. [laughs]
I mean, I’m really inspired by nature when it comes to color. And I’m starting to look toward space, actually. There are some amazing colors and hues they can take with the Hubble spacecraft now—colors you never saw before in your life, on Earth! Not exactly, anyway, you know?
I mean, I grew up in the ’70s, so, you know, we experimented with everything. [laughs] Everybody from that time experimented.
DAN: You’re not talking about LSD now, are you?
TOMMY: Yeah—we were in space and mushrooms and LSD. I grew up in the Midwest where there was nothing to do, you know? There were just Ford pickups and farms, and we would just go camp and eat mushrooms and whatever, you know?
Q: Where were you born?
TOMMY: I was born in South Dakota—Gettysburg. My dad was building a dam up there. But I grew up in South Sioux City, Nebraska, which is where South Dakota, Iowa, and Nebraska meet.
Yeah, it’s fun. Eyewear is an addiction. Even the customers become addicted to eyewear.
DAN: Well, I don’t entirely agree with you…
TOMMY: If you feel the acetate, you can actually feel the difference, you know?
DAN: Aha. So Takiron comes from cotton?
TOMMY: Well, it’s basically a pulp-generated oil.
Even our off-cuts—when we destroy them in what’s called the sho-kyakujo—they have a precipitator. No gas is released into the atmosphere. If you want to biodegrade these, you can. But if you don’t, they’re going to last longer than anything.
Anybody that’s re-using acetate or plastics for eyewear, I think, is making a mistake. It’s just going to end up in the ocean. And the quality isn’t there. If they want to re-use those materials, they should use them for bulk architectural things—like casting walls. And we already make enough from our cuts, the way we cut, the way we do things. A plain color sheet—depending on the frame—you’re going to get like 20-something fronts from a sheet.
Even in Japan, we don’t have that many accounts. We have like-minded accounts. Because people will go there. It’s not like we’re opening doors that are close to each other. One area—one store. That’s it. For everything we do.
DAN: I like what I see…
TOMMY: The Craft Line has a straight temple, but you can do a slight bend or shape them into a library temple.
But look how nice it is when you use the same color, you know? It’s just a good way of finishing that.
DAN: You are totally right about that.
TOMMY: Even these smaller hinges—see the star nut?
DAN: I can see that you are very proud.
TOMMY: I love it! This company is only 10 years old, but we grew organically, step-by-step.
DAN: Let me see this frame on you. [hands Tommy the Matheson]
Yeah, I like that a lot.
TOMMY: This is the beanie! I should have brought my beanie.
TOMMY: The Craft Line in sunglasses is also quite sexy—very minimal, but it enhances.
I actually made a lens this color too—the same as the frame. We did that with a couple of them. But I’m making some new lenses now. For whatever reason, browns are very good right now. We have three tones of browns—from a chocolate, to a medium, to a light one like BR66. Just sell a ton of them. In Japan, people aren’t wearing dark lenses because of masks. But here in L.A., they probably still wear the darker ones.
TOMMY: This one on the “Krings” nose—the nose pad arm is close enough that you can use them in the Western world or for Asian clients too. But a lot of times, when people put a Krings nose on an acetate frame, the pad arm is too long—it doesn’t work for Western faces. There’s a way to do it that makes it really functional.
DAN: OK, terrific! I have to run…
TOMMY: Can we do a picture together so I can put it on my Instagram?
DAN: Absolutely.
TOMMY: Let’s do it by your sign!