Dear Laura,

I thought I would post a comment about the recent article you did on sunglasses. I do not have the article with me to refer to, but here are my comments about the piece, and it is in the form of an article that I had written for another journal, but which was never used. I know that Jonanthan Prynn on the consumer affairs desk would be just as likely a recipient, but I think that you should be apprised of this fashion accessories 'scoop', too:

Imagine my surprise, while net-searching for sunglasses, I found adamsimmonds.co.uk.

He's a well-known Primrose Hill optometrist, well-popular with the Sadie and Jude set. Amazingly, he actually exposes the £multi-billion designer-sunglasses industry to be, largely, a fraud.

Simmonds sells, for £185 each, 'Paul Smith' sunglasses. On his site he admits that 'the lenses in that range are sub-standard, but not as bad as Chanel, Gucci, Prada, etc.'

Do not doubt the significance of Simmonds's 'Gerald Ratner' moment. In 1991, Mr. Ratner wrecked his jewelry company commercially by admitting that some goods he sold were 'total crap'.

Last year, the Financial Times Saturday magazine did a glossy article on sunglasses. In it, lense-technology and eye-protection were virtually ignored. The article concentrated solely on the ocular chic - the 'bling' - of diamante-adorned frames. The Beckhams, and Paris & Britney, also, sadly, influence sales of such optically low-value sunglasses.

Spielberg won't film with defective cameras, so why should you view the world through expensive, low-protection, plastic face-candy (as Lulu Guinness refers to the cheap, dangerous plastic sunglasses which bear her name)?

But, how DO you find proper sunglasses? Look inside the concave of each lense. Move the sunglasses in your hand in so that shape-reflections 'travel' across the lense: rocking sideways, top to bottom, and diagonal. If you see any 'bowing' or 'ripples' of the reflected images, AT ALL, don't buy; they're distorted.

Every pair I examined in 'Vision Express' on Oxford Street has this problem. Proper sunglasses - not exceeding 63mm in diameter - are technically flawless: reflections will keep their true shape in every 'plane'. All sunglasses retailing north of £50 should have such traits; there's NO excuse. Elite sunglasses feature American or German or Japanese-designed glass lenses. Serengeti Eyewear's 'Drivers' and 'Sedona', are superb. So too is the brown/copper lenses-range from Revo, Persol & Maui Jim. Ray-Ban's 'B-15' is excellent.

The advanced lense-coatings on virtually all these superbly engineered glasses keep out all damaging UVA, UVB, 'blue light', and Infra-red rays. For competitive sports like skiing, surfing, etc., you may prefer shatterproof polycarbonate lenses. Bolle and Vuarnet are, generally, the two brands with the best optics. Oh, and shop at US vendors like peepers.com for 65% off UK high street prices.

You now know more than every fashion writer in the world...and virtually all sunglasses store staff. Heed a leading optometrist's eyesight health-warning, not mine! END.

.........

The reason for writing this, Laura, was because there tends to be a sycophantic relationship between many fashion writers and designers. This trickles down to every accessory which bears the name of that designer.

Last night, I watched a re-run of a BBC4 on BBC2 documentary about Haute Couture. The journalist presenter, examining a complimentary gift she received at a fashion show, remarked: 'So, this is why so many fashion writers are famously uncritical about the industry'.

In your article, Laura, you gushed about your Chanel sunglasses...the same sunglasses that Adam Simmonds - his conscience pricked - said held badly substandard lenses.

This is important. As days get sunnier, and the ozone layer disintegrates, and we take more foreign holidays, sunglasses are being accentuated in the media now. Today, there were pictures of Victoria Beckham on the ski slopes wearing wholly unsuitable 'sunglasses' for skiing. It was easy to tell that they were street fashion sunglasses, and not the Serengetis or Bolle polycarbonates she should have been wearing.

There is an opportunity-cost to wearing junk like Oliver Peoples, Tom Ford, Miu Miu 'sunglasses'...and that cost is the fact that, in high UV and blue-light situations, you're not, in that moment wearing proper protection.

Even Ray Ban, as a brand, is being run into the ground by Luxottica. The Italians have taken that famous brand name and stuck it on some of the most egregious rubbish, offering no harmful-ray protection, 'sunglasses' that I have ever seen. There is an optometrist on the eastern-end of Oxford Street. It sells some of this new range of Ray Ban products, and there should be a warning label on this trash. So too, should Oakley be censured. Oakley's new slim profile 'sunglasses' are hugely compositionally distorted. And the price tag of these new Oakleys? £150 to £200.

Luxottica and Mondottica love the fact that the average person knows next to nothing about proper care for the eyes. This is carte blanche for them to peddle dangerous 'face candy' which have good looking frames, but fail miserably in the primary-purpose stakes: that of protecting eyes in UV-intense environments.

If, by the way, you want to see Adam Simmonds expose the designer sunglasses industry, go to adamsimmonds.co.uk. Click on 'buy online'. In the text box, write 'Blinde' (just as an entry brand name). click, then, on any image of a pair of Blinde sunglasses. In the top of the image, click on 'Lense Information'. In the box that opens up, click on 'Paul Smith'.

You will see Simmonds say to the effect that 'Oliver Peoples uses good quality lenses, but I can't really say the same for the Paul Smith range of sunglasses lenses. But they're not as bad as some other brands I'm not supposed to mention....Gucci, Prada, Chanel, etc.'

Laura, want me to fill in the 'etc.' bit? Right, here you go: Mucci, Fiorucci, Linda Farrow, Miu Miu, Fendi, YSL, DKNY, D&G, Calvin Klein, Lulu Guinness. That's right, Laura, the chinese plastic factories which make this rubbish have no idea, nor care any, about correct lense-fabrication.

There is a perception that well, Bolle, and Vuarnet, and Serengeti are only for the marine/aviation/rock-climbing markets...and don't you be dissing my lovely Chanels. But the fact is that proper, superb sunglasses like Serengeti brand DO make superb, stylish tortoiseshell frames, and black frames, and white frames, to go with their superb borosilicate-glass Sedona and Drivers lenses. But the vogue for over-sized Paris Hilton lenses and the designer names has almost irrevocably pushed the names of the proper sunglasses of the shelves forever.

And it is yours and your readers eyesight which may suffer from this love for designer names, in the future.

K Jennings.