Boutiques

Founded in 2014, Binokle is a unique, female-owned independent eyewear boutique based in Krakow, Poland that offers customers a hands-on optical styling approach paired with an extensive range of artistically designed frames. Situated in a country that neighbours Ukraine, recent years haven’t been easy for the boutique, but their list of loyal clientele only continues to grow. Victoria G. L. Brunton spoke to founder Paulina Bajdas to find out more…

Tell us a little about yourself: your education / professional background…My name is Paulina Bajdas, I live in Krakow and I opened Binokle at the beginning of 2014. People often ask me why I decided to start my business, and it’s because I wanted to contribute to the local community. I was seeking self-accomplishment, my place in the world, and had worked in different industries looking for things that I was good at. There was a period in my life when I worked as a stylist, in a shop belonging to a well-known chain of optical salons. There, I noticed that people found it difficult to choose frames that fit them and also that the eyewear market in Krakow was very limited. Clients usually find themselves being offered mass-produced glasses, and the whole market of independent brands was being ignored.

I graduated with a Masters in business management alongside a two-year diploma in styling and make-up. At that time, I decided to enrol in an optics school and began looking for financing to open the first Krakow eyewear shop with independent brands. My first choice was MOSCOT, I was actually the first person to import this brand to Poland. After that, I successfully  started to bring in new brands that I discovered during optics exhibitions in Milan, Paris and Munich. Later on, I decided to expand my knowledge and I finished optometry at the Medical University in Poznań.

How do you select the brands you stock? I want all the frames in my shop to be top-notch quality, I don’t want to see my clients being forced to return here with a complaint. I feel satisfied when selling high quality products and my customer service is second to none. Another important aspect of the products I stock is interesting and extraordinary design. From the very beginning, my goal was to offer frames that people feel comfortable with but also feel special wearing. A lot of my customers are not afraid to highlight their appearance with bold frames. I stock brands from all over the world, and because of that I introduce aesthetics from different places; from minimalistic Scandinavian style to Spanish brands that are colorful, bold and without limitations. I travel a lot, and in doing so I look for inspiration. When I visited Lisbon, for example, I was inspired by a beautiful shop with vintage frames. After that experience, I decided to introduce a small vintage collection in Binokle — it was well received.

Did you always want to work in fashion / eyewear or was it an offshoot of another passion? Before opening the store, I worked as a stylist on photoshoots. I always had a feel for aesthetics and style. Like a photographer who can always find a good composition and capture the real character of whoever’s being photographed, on seeing a client I immediately know which frames would complement their character in the best possible way. That is a kind of talent.

Does Binokle have a certain type of customer? If I would need to describe the type of clients that visit us, I would say that they are very aware of what they want, they don’t blindly follow trends and they look for the best quality in a unique form. For them, showing off a brand name is not at all important; what matters most is an interesting design. I’m lucky to have a pleasant, open list of clientele and a lot of regular customers who buy frames only from me.

What have been some of the most popular trends within the Polish eyewear market? After the trial of Johnny Depp and Amber Heard, I got a lot of calls from people asking what glasses Johnny was wearing and where they could get them. Frankly speaking, I don’t care about trends. I value timeless design – something which doesn’t necessarily mean classic and boring, but rather pieces that won’t go out of fashion in a couple of years. When a client decides to wear a pair of my frames that they bought 5 years ago, nobody will say they’re unfashionable. The only pattern that I notice is that my clients are attached to certain brands and their line of products. However, I am well aware that my products are only of interest to a small percentage of all eyewear users.

How does the current political situation with Russia and Ukraine affect business, if at all? When the war in Ukraine broke out, life in Krakow stopped for a whole two weeks. Shops and restaurants were empty, all the inhabitants were primarily focused on helping refugees and we put our energy into helping Ukrainians. Simultaneously, we feared the worst. “What will happen with Poland?” This was on everybody’s mind. However, life needs to go on and local businesses won’t function if there aren’t any clients, so we swiftly went back to normal. I’m proud that my fellow citizens managed to face this problematic situation with strength and courage; our Eastern European neighbours are our brothers and sisters.

Are there any Polish eyewear brands / designers you’re excited about at the moment? No one Polish is on my radar at the moment, unfortunately, but I admire Kasia Łupińska at Massada.

Tell us about the performance / dancers we saw on your Instagram recently? This was a project about the pandemic, portraying a certain feeling of emptiness that surrounded us during isolation. It was an expression of hope and fear of uncertainty. These dancers from Krakow Dance Theatre perform behind shop windows annually, Binokle was one among other boutiques selling niche brands that participated this year. It was the third consecutive year that I had the pleasure of welcoming these artists into my store. A lot of people gathered to watch; I am always thrilled to see so many people participating in local artistic events. (more…)

Through the use of colour, sculpture and unconventional materials, Dana Prekopova, founder of IOKO Optika, and the eyewear collection IOKO x NA – aims to educate the Slovakian customer and provide an independent alternative to commercial eyewear. From one-of-a-kind pieces to frames that would be equally at home in the Guggenheim, Dana spoke to Eyestylist about her worlds of frames and retail, which colourfully collide. 

1. How would you describe yourself in three words? Precise, creative, detail-oriented.

2. Where do you find yourself looking for inspiration? My inspiration for each IOKO x NA collection is strongly linked to one specific face – we call it my “muse”. I love to visualize each character, which step by step becomes a face I envision wearing the respective shape. So far, four separate collections have been created with unique and very characterful Slovak actresses as the muse. Perfection in beauty is not what I am looking for, it’s actually quite the opposite. I like to find beauty in imperfection, asymmetry and general uniqueness. Each frame in every series always has something in common with the next: there is always a fixed element, which might appear on the temple or in another part of the design. Above: Dana with her son the architect Alan Prekop

The last collection was very specific, a bit more complicated but all the more fun! Two separate lines of shapes and colours were created at the same time and my two sisters Marta and Lea, were part of the visual output – I have an identical twin and one older sister, but we all look very much alike. My “muse” for the collection for Winter 2021 was an actress called Kerekes Vica, who is very similar to us in looks but younger. She has her own special features, so the design for her was quite different than what we’d created for me and my sisters. It was challenging but at the same time it felt very brave. (Youtube film: https://youtu.be/tNiCN-tA31s)

3. The use of colours, patterns and sculptural shaping in your IOKO x NA frames is incredibly striking, tell us more about your design process? Yes, you are right. I try to push my designs to the edge of wearability whilst also remaining consistent with the artistic mastery of their handmade process. I’m fascinated by colour. It is so much fun to use unusual palettes when creating frames: we have worked with orange, fuchsia, purple, bright red and orchid pink since 2018 – a time when other independent designers weren’t very interested in these tones. Since then, I have noted designers I really admire doing the same thing: they have been enchanted by the richness of these brave colours, just as I have. Each pair of glasses is unique, there is nothing like them in other parts of the world in the same shape and colour – we are always one step ahead. Any pair I design must be different and if the demand for a specific colour and shape remains high, I just change the design slightly to honour my passion for originality.

4. Which frame, of any one you’ve ever designed, best represents the IOKO customer? Well, this does not have an unequivocal answer. IOKO celebrates its 18th birthday this year – as always, the beginnings were not easy. At first we needed to educate the customer: in our country, Slovakia, there is no tradition regarding the manufacture of glasses, and the term “independent design” was simply unheard of. At the end of the day, this lack of knowledge was due to so many years spent under a Communist regime. My mission was to teach customers the difference between commercially produced glasses and those manufactured independently.

5. What drives you forward? The fact that the customers have become used to us and the idea of our technique, so they want our products more and more. We have an IOKO clientele that only want one-of-a-kind glasses and I am so glad I can provide this in each of our collections. We have recently seen a lot of interest in our IOKO x NA frames across the industry… mostly before SILMO 2022.

6.What is your stance on sustainability? Our zero-waste manufacturing process was kind of created by accident. Since I worked with a jewellery designer on our very first collection, the idea came about very spontaneously that we would use the ‘waste’ material from the cut-outs to make an original piece of jewellery for a specific pair of spectacles. Since then, we have continued to make use of all usable scraps of material – not only for the jewel – even if we manage to keep some acetate from the plate we cut the frame from, we use that as well. It’s nice when the client gets to know the material in its raw, unprocessed form. It helps them understand how much work there is behind the beautiful, polished result in their hands.

7. Which is your personal favourite frame, and why? It’s probably the very first one. It was created especially for me and to this day I’m still struggling with the fact that it was stolen from me shortly after it was made. It was a painful loss at the time, but I have started to look at it in a more positive light. It happened when I was starting out in the business and there were various doubts and uncertainties in my head – whether my bold ideas would be interesting. I reached out for advice, and the person who turned out to be a thief actually confirmed for me that they really were brilliant! Today, we have achieved awards like the National Design Award 2021, so I will no longer fight with my internal doubts.

8. If you could see your frames styled with any particular designer / stylist’s work, who / what label would it be? Of course I have my favorite designers, many of whom I have more than just a working relationship with. There are several of them who are so outstanding, they boldly present various forms of design, including unique and artistic eyewear objects. I have my own way of doing things, and it makes me happy when I manage to come up with something that does not resemble anything that already exists. I am lucky that IOKO Optika is, to me, the most beautiful space, where our own brand can be presented in all its full glory, honouring its core uniqueness.

9. Could you tell us about your new store and any other exciting developments on the horizon for IOKO? Yes, we have our new showroom in the heart of the Old Town in Bratislava. We spent “teenage years” and our youth in different parts of our small city, but as we matured we moved to the nice modern part of this area. This district of Bratislava is close to my heart because I grew up and studied here. The space for the new Ioko shop was selected by the architect Alan Prekop who happens to be my son – I really wanted him to work on the project from design to implementation. He knows my passion for eyewear very well and how I work personally with each client. He has created a very unique, gallery-like space using very unusual decorative elements: enriching traditional materials such as wood, steel and natural clay with a luminescent foil where our glasses are displayed. Due to this luminescent effect, the room changes colour several times a day. We talked a lot during the process and I always knew that the showroom itself would create the feeling of exclusivity, displaying all the unique pieces from independent designers like you would see in an art gallery. I had only one request: to have a place where I could show the customer how our glasses are made. When the shop is closed, you can find me sitting down with my tools in this work space; right in front of the window beside the street – I love it when people knock on my window and wave or say hello!

10. Do you have any thoughts on the ever-evolving trend of technology fusing with luxury fashion retail? I believe my dreams and ideas will never pass me by, and that behind every door I open there are still a few mysterious doors closed, beckoning me to look inside them. Currently, I am doing a workshop at VSVU at the Department of Experimental Design and I am looking forward to encouraging young designers to experiment with various new materials, and trying to make glasses out of something unusual. Of course, I have plans to continuously develop my brand and to reach opticians in LA, Perth, Melbourne, Barcelona, Madrid, and Amsterdam so that they will get to know our work. So far, the hardest thing for me was to say goodbye to some of our babies and let them out into the world – I am working hard on this now so that even more can fly out of the nest. For more details visit https://ioko.sk

An interview by Victoria G. L. Brunton exclusively for Eyestylist.com – images provided by IOKO Optika – all rights reserved

The new store reflects the strong ties with nature and its Californian home

Californian brand SALT. Optics has opened a new flagship store, offering customers the first direct experience of the brand, its philosophy and commitment to eyewear quality in its home state of California. The store is located at The Shops at Sportman’s Lodge, 12833 Ventura Blvd, Studio City, CA 91604, an exclusive shopping complex open seven days a week (www.shopsatsportsmenslodge.com)

The store, which has a minimal design, with concrete floors, whitewashed walls, dark blue fittings and linear wood shelves which display the glasses and sunglasses, houses the full collection of SALT. Optics products as well as offering a few limited editions only available on site. With professional opticians on staff, the aim was to offer an outstanding service at retail where a great fit and style can be achieved with in person assistance. Some exclusive custom options are available for lenses as well as bespoke coloured lenses. To find out more, visit www.saltoptics.com

The new architect-designed store in the heart of Bratislava, Slovakia was created with “love and precision” as a space for independent design

IOKO Optika has opened a new state-of-the-art design boutique this summer, designed by the architect Alan Prekop. One of the key characteristics of the design is the use of architectural materials which relate to eyewear products, and especially natural materials such as clay, wood and steel. The clay, in the form of plaster, is used on the surfaces of the walls creating an organic look throughout while a clay table – produced with the ceramicist Zheni – acts as a display for the glasses.

IOKO Optika is run by Dana Prekopova, and was first opened in its previous location in 2005. Prekopova is an expert and specialist in small independent brands and has launched her own eyewear project IOKO & NA eyewear. The new store stocks exclusive labels such as VUE DC, Anne et Valentin and Kuboraum, as well as Prekopova’s own collection, IOKO & NA. To find out more about the store’s activities in recent years visit Eyestylist’s feature last feature at https://www.eyestylist.com/2019/05/dana-prekopova-ioko-bratislava/

Bernolakova 9, Bratislava, Slovakia. Photography by Welin Nagy provided by kind permission of IOKO Optika www.ioko.sk