Warby Parker + Donor's Choose Collaboration: Eyewear Designer meets Classroom Projects

Hi Lovelies,
This post is a little different to my usual post but it is always interesting to add a little flavor to switch up my style every now and then. I was contacted by Warby Parker to help launch their collaboration with Donor's Choose which would go live today. First off, this is NOT a sponsored post as I know a couple of people get turned off when they see it is a sponsored post and I have not received any compensation for this post. There, that's out of the way, so grab your cuppa tea or coffee and relax while I chat you up. 





I am sure you must be ogling these lovely stylish Sunglasses especially with the hot summer weather around. What if I told you, you could totally buy this guilt-free knowing that you would be supporting a child's project by buying one of these sunglasses from the bespoke collection? Oh yeah..it is so true. If you are like me and you have never heard about Warby Parker or Donor's Choose, I'd be happy to introduce them to you although they are totally different organisations. I think they are a bit more popular in USA than UK. 

Warby Parker is the brilliant result of a collaboration between four close friends who decided they had had enough of all the overpriced and bland eye ware out there. They sat down and had a plan to create high quality yet better looking prescription glasses and sunglasses at a fraction of the price of many overpriced brands out there...Voila!! Warby Parker was born. If you are curious like me and you want to find out how they came about their name, click here for the background behind that. Warby Parker is an American Based Company which specializes in reeling out unique and high quality collections of both prescription and sunglasses range for both Males and Females.



Their first collection had 27 limited run pieces which were all meticulously crafted using the finest custom acetates and materials. It blows my mind to know each pair of glasses is hand crafted with custom fit with anti-reflective polycarbonate lenses. You may not be familiar with materials used for making lenses but I am very familiar with them because I have been wearing glasses for a really long time. lenses made with Polycarbonate have better quality and are usually thinner and lighter than the traditional plastic or glass lenses. With these glasses, you also have anti-scratch qualities incorporated. Many Eyewear companies may ask you to pay extra to have anti-reflective or anti-scratch or thinner lenses whereas you do not need to pay any extra as it is already incorporated. If you want to know more about how they produce their glasses, Hop on to this page on their website,...


Moving on, Warby Parker don't stop at just producing high quality and affordable eyeware and sunglasses, they take a further step and give back to the society through many partnerships with non-profit organisations including Vision Spring where they happily donate a pair of glasses to someone in need for every pair of glasses they sell. In fact, this month they have reached an important milestone of donating half a million glasses to people in need. Find out here about their donations  Isn't that amazing?!!!! So, if you decide to splurge on any of their bespoke sunglasses, you can cut back on any guilt knowing that someone in need in a less developed country would be getting a free pair...Statistics show that there are over 1 billion people all around the world who cannot see properly have no access to a pair of glasses which would inadvertently affect their ability to either go to school or hold down a job. Pretty sad but very true :-((

Jasper from the Ocean Avenue Collection

I have had a look around their latest collection on their website, I really wish I was in America right now because they look so good and I would love to try them all on (You can use their website app to try on the glasses though but I am a bit old school and I still need to try it on in the flesh). They have recently released their latest collections: The Ocean Avenue Collection and the The Meridian Collection. 

Flannery from the Meridian Collection

Both collections invoke the feeling of Summer, Beaches, Soft Sea Breeze and Relaxation. While the Ocean Avenue Collection is inspired by New York City in the 1970s and 1980s with quirky and vintage designs, the Meridian Collection is inspired by renegade travelers and roaming iconoclasts with an edgy, vintage vibe with a slight Parisian twist. I love both collections but I can see myself leaning towards the Ocean Avenue Collection which is on trend now although the Meridian Collection would suit all trends and seasons, thanks to its vintage side.




                            Collaboration Collection: Warby Parker and Donor's Choose
Now to the crux of the matter? What kind of collaboration is Warby Parker having with Donor's Choose, you ask? I am pretty sure you may have heard about Donor's Choose. I got really emotional reading about the Donor's Choose story on their website because it is truly inspirational. Donor's Choose is a non-profit organisation founded by Charles Best who was a school teacher in a High School in Bronx. He usually funded many of his classroom projects and school supplies for his students because he was dedicated to them and their education. 

 One day, he decides to design a website where school teachers can post classroom projects for funding from donors who had as little as $1 to donate to any classroom project they fancy. His fellow teachers loved the idea and posted a couple of projects which Charles Best anonymously funded because he did not know any donors. Of course, these teachers did not know that and were amazed at the results and spread the good news and it became very popular... 




Sometime in 2003, Oprah Winfrey heard about Donor's Choose and promoted them on her show and let's say that was a huge turning point. Few seconds after her show aired, their website crashed due to so many visitors and when it got back up, they were welcomed by $250, 000 donations, how amazeballs is that? ....the rest is history. Donor's Choose has funded many classroom projects and has put a smile on hundreds of thousands of children's faces. Would you like to be responsible for putting a smile on a child's face? I hope the answer is yes because Warby Parker and Donor's Choose have come together to create a unique collaboration with a design and collection to go with it. Both organisations who always have their consumers in mind with the best they can offer have designed one of their most flattering sunglasses with a twist of tortoise shell known as the Gardner...isn't it just gorgeous?





How does it work, you ponder? With every $95 frame from this collaboration's collection (both prescription and sunglasses ranges), Warby Parker would donate $30 in form of a Donate Choose Gift Card so that each customer can contribute to whichever Donor's Choose classroom projects they fancy. In addition to that, Warby Parker would also donate a pair of glasses to someone in need which means your purchase would benefit two worthy causes; Donor's Choose and Glasses for those in need who can't afford it. This is the only time Mathematics rules are defied because 1=2 :-))). 











Some celebrities like Mindy Kaling (Actress, The Office on NBC) are already supporting this collaboration; let's join her, Charles Best (Founder, Donor's Choose) and support this collaboration too...You can shop and support this collaboration here.






My sidebar also has a link to the donor's choose website if you also want to support any of their classroom projects. I hope you have enjoyed this post as much as I did.I really loved writing this post and I hope you can feel it from your screen. If you want more non-sponsored posts for good causes like this, let me know in the comment section....toodles...xx See you in my next post...