In London, 1967, Graham Cutler and Tony Gross met in optometry school and started a partnership that would grow to become one of the UK’s boldest eyewear brands. Cutler & Gross, founded in 1969, first began as a small optician’s office in Knightsbridge offering handmade bespoke frames to their clients. Their unique approach to eyewear featured bold designs with strong materials and is often credited with pioneering the concept of eyewear as a fashion accessory in the United Kingdom. In 1982, due to rapid expansion of the eyewear industry, Cutler & Gross was forced to follow suit by hiring a new head of design, Marie Wilkinson, who has maintained this role for the last 40 years and still continues to design frames for Cutler & Gross today.  

Cutler & Gross has built a reputation over their almost half a century in business and to commemorate their founders’ wide portfolio of work, The Cutler & Gross Museum opened to the public in August 2011. The Museum features over 1000 designer frames dating all the way back to their first frame, released in 1969. The Museum also features frames that were bespoke and worn by a plethora of celebrities including Madonna, Lady Gaga and Daniel Craig. If you’ve ever tried to sit on the fancy looking box that turned out to be a multi-million dollar piece of art, at The Museum, all of the frames on display are free to try on. That’s right, they’re totally happy to entertain your dreams of power strutting while wearing the original Kingsman frame to see if you really do have what it takes to be a super spy.  

On top of the fashion statement that a bold frame can make, what we here at The Optical Shoppe love most about Cutler & Gross is their durability. When Cutler and Gross started their luxury eyewear brand, they knew they wanted to push the boundaries of design but they wanted to make sure that they didn’t sacrifice the structural integrity while doing so. With this in mind, every Cutler & Gross frame is built to last and typically has a number of design elements that are conducive to the overall functionality of the frame. Whether you’re a stylish Samantha or a functional Fred, Cutler & Gross is guaranteed to have a bold, fashion-forward frame for you!