The sketches, assures Alain Marhic, had been patient for several years. “In my old life at Quiksilver [between 1998 and 2008], I was in charge of the eyewear division for a time, both optical and solar. And as soon as I founded March La.b, I thought that one day I would make glasses there. Now that his French brand, which is fifteen years old this year, has acquired enough credibility in the watchmaking discipline, he allows himself this step aside. With his partner, Jérôme Mage – who already owns the eyewear brand Jacques Marie Mage – Marhic began by bringing out old models in acetate to reflect on what he liked in these accessories “which, to be successful, do not have to disguise the face”.
Since watching The War According to Charlie Wilson (2007), a kitsch and gossip comedy by Mike Nichols set in the anti-Communist Cold War several years ago, on a plane to Los Angeles, he no longer wears anything but glasses. smoked. “One of the characters, played by Philip Seymour Hoffmann, swears by light brown, vintage lenses. Sunglasses give you a little anachronistic or serial killer side, it’s true, but in the meantime, everyone recognizes you! It is therefore two tinted pairs, in three variations of green and with aviator frames in golden steel and acetate, that March La.b draws, as if they had escaped from the 1980s shown by the film. Made in Italy, they display discreet intertwining lines, echoing the brand’s graphic logo. Usually visible on the crown or on the back of the watches, here they are traced in relief in the metal, on the branch and the tenon.