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Tennis Racket
Oliver Goldsmith Eyewear - Enlarge image
Tennis Racket
- Object:
Sunglasses
- Place of origin:
Great Britain (made)
- Date:
1985 (made)
- Artist/Maker:
Oliver Goldsmith Eyewear (manufacturer)
- Materials and Techniques:
Etched plastic
- Credit Line:
Given by A. Oliver Goldsmith, in memory of his father, Charles Oliver Goldsmith
- Museum number:
T.245A-1990
- Gallery location:
In Storage
Philip Oliver Goldsmith, a salesman for a small optical firm, founded this eyewear company in London in 1926. In 1935 his son Charles Goldsmith entered the firm with the aim of making glasses a fashion item. From the company’s offices in Poland Street, his sons A. Oliver and Ray Goldsmith built upon the company’s reputation for attention-grabbing designs and solicited celebrity endorsement for their products. Key clients included Lord Snowdon, the actress Diana Dors, Princess Grace of Monaco and Diana, Princess of Wales.
A Oliver Goldsmith created this sunglasses frame, titled ‘Tennis Racket’, in 1985, as a re-design of T.243 E-1990, the original tennis racket design from 1956. This frame reflects fashion’s enthusiasm for a black and white palette. They were sold with two pairs of lenses: one etched with a pattern of tennis strings, the other plain.This design is also housed in the collection of the Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Museum.