Acetate

Cellulose acetate is a many splendoured thing. It is also the reason a pair of spectacles can be any colour at all.

Made from plants, not petroleum

Acetate is a semi-synthetic material derived from wood pulp and cotton — not the petroleum-based plastic most frames are injection moulded from. That difference is why it behaves the way it does: it is denser, it holds an edge, it takes a polish, and it can be heated and reshaped rather than simply bent until something gives.

It arrives as a solid block. Every frame we make from it is cut, milled, tumbled and polished out of that block, which is a slower way to make a spectacle frame and a better one.

From Mazzucchelli, in Italy

Our acetate comes from Mazzucchelli 1849, in Castiglione Olona near Varese — a family company, six generations in, and the acknowledged world leader in materials for spectacle frames.

They began in 1849 making combs and buttons from horn, bone and tortoiseshell, and moved to cellulose acetate when it became clear it could do everything those materials did without anything having to die for it. We still make frames in horn, so we are fond of the symmetry.

The colour is laid in by hand, block by block. No two sheets are identical, which means no two frames are either — the mottle on yours stops where it stops because of how that particular block was made.

Why we use it

• Light and flexible, putting minimal pressure on the nose and ears.
• Hypoallergenic — a material for all.
• Strong, and tested in house against the competition.
• Adjustable. Warmed gently, acetate can be reshaped to your head, and reshaped again a year later when it has settled. Any of our stores will do it, for as long as you own the frame.
• Repairable. An acetate frame can be rebuilt. A moulded one usually cannot.
• Finished in gloss or matte.

Looking after it

Clean it with the cloth that came with it and warm water. Avoid alcohol, ammonia and leaving it on a dashboard in July — acetate softens with heat, which is useful in our hands and less useful in a hot car.

Browse the acetate spectacles or the acetate sunglasses.