20/20: Where did the idea for Scream Eyewear come from?
Jason Shyer: The idea for Scream comes from a few places. Me along with my father and brother are all musicians and love rock music in its many different forms. I personally am a metalhead, played in bands, and always loved the artwork and mythology that comes along with this genre, and I’ve always had a desire to combine this with my “day job.” Another source of inspiration is that throughout the fashion, clothing and accessory world, you see this type of imagery associated with rock and metal music. There are many brands doing things with skulls, snakes and other bits of playful evil. You even see in fashion culture Kim Kardashian and Rihanna walk around in Metallica shirts. Most authentically, I wanted something for myself—now I get to wear a rad looking aviator with a guitar neck that turns into a dragon’s claw.
What do you hope your customers gain from this new collection?
There are few, if any brands, that would think to put the kind of metal castings on a frame that we do. Certainly, none that fully market themselves to a consumer based on the culture of just loving loud rock music. I don’t think people realize just how passionate a true fan of this type of music is—to love a rock band is to have a personal relationship with something deeply important to you. Our understanding of this culture taps into that in everything we do, whether it’s a metal casting of a ghost claw brandishing a microphone or having a song pairing for every frame in the collection. Through this, our customers will have a very direct line of consumers to sell to—and a bigger group than might be expected. Scream is as much for suburban moms, dads and kids who drop a couple hundred bucks to see Metallica or Queen, as it is for headbanging touring musicians or someone who rides a Harley.
Can you go into a little more detail about the design process of each Scream frame?
Our design process is very collaborative. We initially provided our design team in Italy with concepts that are cool to us (for example, skulls, Flying V guitars, claws, etc.). From there, our head designer will provide us with our first drawings. We’ll then either approve something or more likely start making small changes, and have a healthy give and take to get it the drawing to where everyone is happy. We also have some signatures already that we consider incorporating (our metal endpiece decor is inspired by a Flying V guitar for example). From there, we’ll work with Mazzuchelli to select colors to prototype. Once realized, we can finalize our frame selection. Our standard is that every frame for Scream should tell a small story of the majesty of rock!
