Ephemeral Industries

Jaegers ([ˈjɛːɡɐ], Jäger, Hunter)

KOSHER EGGROLL.

20. draw a hockey player as a tarot card

judgement

(not exactly a player but. they’re in there)

Sunglasses with Personality

Richard Merkin, who was known for his art, as well as his flamboyant sense of style, has this quote I love. In talking with The Daily News Record in 1986, he said: “Dressing, like painting, should have a residual stability, plus punctuation and surprise. Somewhere, like in Krazy Kat, you’ve got to throw the brick.”

That’s how I feel about sunglasses nowadays. While you’ll rarely go wrong with the classics, eyewear can be a great opportunity to express some real personality. Especially if you, like me, favor more conservative pieces elsewhere. Ray Ban’s Wayfarers and aviators have been popular for decades because they flatter almost everyone, but with a standard navy suit or even a sport coat, they can also make you look like a G-Man (or worse, a Blues Brother). Searching for something more unique – that both fits your face and sense of style – takes work, but it also pays off. 

One of the best starting points is to play with color. Instead of something in black, consider eyewear with light brown, faux-tortoiseshell, stone gray, or even clear colored frames. There are a million companies nowadays that make your standard sunglasses with the keyhole-shaped gap between the bridge and nose pads. Almost any of them would work with everything from tailored clothing to casualwear. Don’t get too caught in worrying if the style “fits.” Andy Warhol can be seen above wearing a thinner pair of sunglasses with a thick and heavy motorcycle jacket. Sometimes contrast is the point. 

If you want to play within an aesthetic, think of how style has evolved over the decades. Slightly squared off shapes can be a hip way to accessorize a 1960s-inspired suit. Thinner, slightly oversized sunglasses with wire frames can express the sleaziness of the ‘70s. Rounder oversized sunglasses can feel very ‘90s and early-aughts. Allyn Scura is a great website if you want to explore different decades and their eyewear styles (each frame is described by era in the product description). Figure out which decade your closet is most inspired by and go from there. 

Some Other Places to Check Out

If you have some coin to spend, I like Lesca, Nackymade, Garrett Leight, Oliver Peoples, Moscot, David Kind, and Robert Marc. Our friend Kyle wears some great eyewear (we’ve featured him in the past). He tells us his sunglasses include Oliver Peoples’ MP-2s, Moscot’s Miltzens in crystal, and Moscot’s Shtarkers with brown gradient lenses. You can see him wearing some of those on his Instagram. 

For something that won’t break the bank, Warby Parker, Classic Specs, and Kent Wang are solid go-tos. As Pete noted in his review, Kent Wang’s $55 frames are a “fantastic middle ground between $200+ shades and the shrugging compromise that is buying sunglasses at CVS.” The bright faux-tortiseshell color here makes these stand out, while the subdued shape is easy to wear. 

For something versatile, I’ve gotten a lot of use out of these thinner frames from Lunettes Kollektion. Mine are in a light toffee brown, which is sold out, but the tortoise color at No Man Walks Alone is pretty close. I find they work with everything from sport coats to workwear to more contemporary styled casualwear. They are on the smaller side, however, so be aware. For something similar, but slightly larger, try Oliver Peoples’ Finley Esq. 

For more browsing, check your local shops (especially those carrying vintage eyewear). A lot of this is personal, so it helps to be able to try on a wide selection of options. If you don’t have anything nearby, you can browse online at End, Need Supply, and Mr. Porter. They have a huge range of sunglasses, a lot of which looks great. 

So Prof. Mark Reidl of Georgia Tech is the best kind of geek, and used some cool scripting to extract all the things on Wikipedia with plot summaries: movies, books, tv episodes, video games, etc. That’s a lot of plot summaries: 112,936, to be exact. 

With a dataset this large, a neural network can achieve impressive results. Sure enough, when I trained this open-source neural network framework on just the titles alone, it consistently came up with titles that were both varied and (usually) plausible. 

Below are some of my favorites, arranged roughly by apparent genre:

Action/Adventure

Titanic Buffalo Pirates: A Fight Dance Story The Bad Legend Conan the Pirate O Bullets Home Transformers Shurk Hat Dies! An Enemy of Bob (Homicide: Life on the Street) Cannibal Spy II American Hero: Fire of Crusty Lego Man Hunt Nancy Drew: The Last Day (film) Surf Crisis Legend of the Experience of Scarlet Freedom Damageboo American Midnight: Swear Dragon Problem

Scifi/fantasy

Under the Daleks Batman and Flancles: The Fun Tree The Legends of World Planet Bomberman’s Love The Enchanted Feed The Star Wars: The Santa Contact The Long Ninja Dove in the Air (film) The History of the Galaxy Bunny Lada City of the Stupid (film) Shy Castle Hamburger (Star Trek: The Next Generation) Swords and Batman: Summer Party ?

Kids/Family

The Boordeeple (2011 film) A Dog’s Toy Friends Boop (Adventure Time) A Dinosaur Quest Colonel Corn (video game) Scooby-Drum New Bear Borky the Pig (film) Excellent Very Broken Christmas The Great Bother Cat (film) Happy Cat in the Yaku Wonder Fireman and Halloween Rules Big Can Flower Home The Green Yaurglar Pig Scooby-Doo'Wagon Traps (video game) Book Dog (film)

Horror

Terror Dog Tree Screaming Zombies of Florence The Trunkelling A Vampire Time for Monster Murder’s Eagle Frozen Bat (film) Haunted Place The Sheep of Evil Barney’s The Devil’s Treachery Merry Scroobers: Crown of Evil The Steel-Pounted Murder King The Shadow of Life of Very Worgy (film) The Mystical Booged of California

Documentary

Market that Knave Spork at Bliss The White Soup An Indiana Office The Last Fish Show The Fish of Education

Restricted section (there were quite a few more of these)

Absilloved Lovers 2: Black Bearfly Dawn Horse Man Academy 5-R: Cowboy Sheeper Wydex Breed Bot 3: The Journey Kitchen Wild Bad Party 109 Pink Moon Indiscreet Maidman

And finally, a list of the most quintessential story titles, obtained by setting the creativity to near zero on a highly-trained network:

Jaegers ([ˈjɛːɡɐ], Jäger, Hunter)

Store Visit: Optimo Hats Chicago

There are precious few true hatters (and true hat shops) in America. Even most specialty hat stores sell cheap (or not-so-cheap) imported hats that belong more on the head of a guy trying to get you to buy a cell phone from a mall kiosk than a Put This On reader. Luckily, there are a few exceptions. Worth & Worth makes lovely hats in New York. I hear Paul’s Hatworks in San Francisco is under new management. And the king of them all is Optimo Hats in Chicago.

While in town recently, I dragged my public radio colleagues into the beautiful downtown shop. Optimo was once a south Chicago institution, but it’s moved its retail operation to tonier digs, down the street from the fine shoe shop Leffot. The interior is dramatically lit, and the staff - I was helped by GM Tiffani Bell, a veteran of the shop - is knowledgeable and helpful.

They’d better be, of course, since these hats aren’t cheap. Beaver felt numbers start at $650 and go up from there. Straw options start a bit lower, but as the weave grows finer, the price climbs - all the way up to $10,000 or more.

Why are they so expensive? Because they’re good. A good hat - especially a felt one - lasts a lifetime. The folks at Optimo know their headwear, and can guide customers into a custom-made hat that will suit their life perfectly. It’s part accessory, part old friend in the making. 

The team helps with fittings in-store, but if you don’t live in Chicago, they’ll also help you over the phone - you can drop them a line at [email protected].

Optimo Hats Chicago

51 W Jackson Blvd., Chicago, IL 60604

For Western style hats, I can recommend O'Farrell Hat Company in Santa Fe, NM. Costly, as any fine custom hat will be, but the combination of superb hand craftsmanship and the use of an antique Conformateur guarantees an unbelievably good fit.

https://ofarrellhatco.com