Beauty and Fashion Blog

It has now been seven long years since motorbike manufacturer Ducati linked up with Oakley to provide what they call performance eyewear, but in essence are glorified, sometimes over priced sunglasses.

Recently the two companies have announced a new range of Oakley Sunglasses complete with Ducati and Moto GP blessing. There was nothing spectacular about this news, but something Lucio Attina, brand development director at Ducati said, gave us an idea. “The philosophy, style and prestige of the two brands are so similar that, if Ducati were an eyewear manufacturing company, it would be Oakley!”, he muttered as part of the launch party.

Flipping this on its head and assuming the same thing applies, Oakley would be Ducati if they made motor bikes and in turn this made us wonder what the other glasses producers would be in they too made vehicles instead of glasses. There are of course some manufacturers who famously already do both, such as Ferrari and (amazingly) Volvo, so ok we’ll give them that one!

Its not much a stretch to assume Lacoste would adopt Lamborghini and that the classy end of the glasses wear from Armani would make cars like Mercedes or Rolls Royce, but what kind of vehicle manufacturer would Alexander McQueens glasses be? A Prius running on grass probably.

Police glasses would undoubtedly become BMW and Ralph Lauren Lexus, but we struggled a little more with Prada and Timberland, although the latter could certainly pass as Land Rover!

How we arrive at these confusing and sometimes irrational choices is a disturbing mix in our heads of logo, brand awareness, the name and those who advertise these goods, which is why it makes sense that Oakley would be the Ducati of the glasses world. What actually determines this in our minds is a confusing mix of logo, brand awareness, the name itself and those who already wear them, which is why I am sure Oakley will be more than happy to be the Ducati of the sunglasses world.