A journey in the eyewear world
The Safilo Group's Guglielmo Tabacchi Gallery will be at Ottica Barberini in Pescara until Saturday, July 21, 2007, with the 'Journey in the eyewear world' exhibition.
The content and layout of the exhibition has been designed to adapt perfectly to a room in the store, which is located in a prestigious Art Nouveau building in the historical center of the city.
The exibition covers the 7-century history of eyewear from its beginnings to the present day.
Through this informative and educational exhibition, the Guglielmo Tabacchi Gallery offers everyone the chance to discover the secrets of eyewear: the items on display are the most representative of the style, customs and techniques of the vision accessory.
The exhibition includes antique rivet and arched bridge spectacles that were used from the early 1300s until the 1600s in Venice, which has the earliest, most reliable information about the invention of eyeglasses. Made from iron, brass or copper, the frames were simple and the lenses were held together by means of a rivet or an arched bridge.
Elegant scissors glasses and pendant lorgnettes, or those with a case-cum-handle, were preferred by the aristocrats and scholars of the 18th and early-19th centuries and who demanded spectacles and cases in precious materials: tortoiseshell, ivory, silver and gold.
The development of spectacles continued with the creation of the first temple spectacles by a British optician in 1728.
The cases used to protect spectacles also had elegant shapes and were embellished with mother-of-pearl, silver and ray skin (galuchat). There is a very fine case which can hold eyeglasses, a ruler and a toothpick.
The exhibition continues with the important pince-nez, protective glasses, sunglasses and vision glasses in metal and plastic with imaginative and practical fashion and professional solutions, and curious 19th-century optical games.
Standing out are the eccentric and original glasses that belonged to famous musical and high-society personalities: Elton John, Elvis Presley, Madonna and the Duke and Duchess of Windsor.
The items exhibited at Ottica Barberini in Pescara belong to the Guglielmo Tabacchi Gallery at Safilo Group headquarters in Padua.
A vast and complete private collection of objects from the optics and ophthalmology world, the Gallery is the result of Safilo president Vittorio Tabacchi's passion for collecting.
In 2006, Safilo became an active member of Museimpresa and its Gallery is now part of the new and growing world of in-house musuems belonging to the largest and most important Italian industries.
