As reported on TechCrunch.
by Darrell Etherington
Google has new frames available for Glass buyers, and they’re specially designed by Diane von Furstenberg. These are the chicest Google Glass frames you can buy, for the time being, and they come in multiple sunglass tints, plus a single pair of optical frames in different colors. The designs are all Glass compatible, but you can also get Glass in a bundle with one pair of the sunglasses and one pair of the optical frames for $1,800 all in at Net-A-Porter, which is cheaper than buying them separately.
Google had promised to deliver collaborations with top designers for its Glass program, and this is the first example of that effort. Google created its own optical frames in titanium for the wearable computer, but Furstenberg is the first to put her own label on accessories for Glass, and the launch of the line comes during the Explorer program, before the device has actually had its proper consumer launch.
As of earlier this year, Google now allows anyone in the U.S. to buy Glass through its Explorer program, which is a change from the invite-based system it had been using previously to slowly introduce new users to the beta test pool. Other planned designer launches for Glass include Ray-Ban , Oakley and others via Luxoticca, but the Fursternberg collection is the first to actually ship.
Will these turn the tide and make Glass more generally palatable to a normal audience of consumers? They could help, but I don’t they’ll reverse entirely all the negative sentiment we’ve seen around the device, which is perhaps best summed up by the Daily Show’s uproarious take on the Glass project.