Native Eyewear… Elevate Your Style

Whether you ski, hike, run, surf or just enjoy the outdoors, you’re the customer Native Eyewear wants to speak to. The company ethos is to be a brand for all ages to enhance and enjoy your experience outside.

For 2018, Native’s product line was inspired by the outdoors and continues to elevate Native’s philosophy of pairing fashionable styles with top-of-the-line performance. We sat down with Native to talk about what’s new in stores and online.

What are some of the innovative products for the season? We have a new ski google that launched this past September called the Drop Zone, pictured above. What’s cool about this google is that one of the biggest requests in the ski/snow industry is lens interchangeability, being able to change out the lens very fast.

The Drop Zone has an exterior button that you just flip up and and the lens pops out. The googles come with a low light lens that you push in, close the button, and you have a lens interchange. It’s fast; it’s easy and you can do it with your gloves on.

The Drop Zone is one of our our most technically advanced models to date. We are excited because we think that this is the best, most durable interchange and super quick change of lens on the market for a ski google.

Is this goggle for both the skier and snowboarder? Yes. For all snow activities.

Are you offering a color range of lenses for this style? Yes. We offer four different color lenses. Each comes with a different colored lens and all of them come with an extra low-light lens to interchange.

Is there another goggle that’s important to the collection?  Yes, our Tank 7, pictured left. This is a really cool goggle and one of the first goggles we came out with. It has a switch rotating outrigger and reversible safety strap. You pull the mechanism on the side of the goggle to allow the strap to flip and you pop it back in to give you a reversible strap. The inside of the  strap always has a reflective coating.

The Take 7 has a React lens, so depending on the light conditions, the lens will adjust the light automatically and does not need the extra low-light lens that the Drop Zone goggle would.

Does your Ambassador team influence the design process? Absolutely. We have a huge group of ambassadors and a really solid group of athletes that have been in the industry for a long time that know what is required of a great lens–especially in backcountry skiing—which was the original positioning for coming out with the Tank 7.

Any complaints? Our number-one complaint is lenses fogging (not ours!) We offer “snowtuned lenses” tested in Colorado by our ambassador team. Every aspect of our lenses gives you the very best performance on snowy terrain and in variable weather.

We came out with this color called desert tan (pictured left). It looks great on everyone and it doesn’t wash you out. This color was actually a color swatch that we found at a gun barrel coating company. The color comes in the Sitecaster and Ashdown models.

Any other new technologies for the season? Yes, our Violet Reflex Lens (shown right). Outside of this lens being gorgeous and beautiful, it has a brown base and color-enhancing technology.

In our sunglass collection we have two bases, a grey base and a brown base. When you are going in and out of light, sometimes you may be in shade and you would want a brown base because it is more friendly to darker conditions, since it is a lighter lens. A grey base is used when you want a darker colored lens for bright, sunny days or days on the water.

So it’s a good idea to try both lenses on before you buy? Absolutely. A lot of it comes down to personal preference. And a lot comes down to what the glasses look like – style, etc.

What else differentiates Native’s Sunglass lens technology? Our lenses have a hydroleophobic coating on the outside. What that means is… let’s say we are kayaking and I flip up water on my sunglasses and I can’t see; with this type of coating water would hit the lens and immediately bead off or you could just shake your glasses and the water would just fall off. It’s amazing! Dirt, mud, water… makes no difference. It will just fall off with no beading on the lenses. And the glasses are extremely light in your hand and on your face. You can find this technology in our new El Jefe glasses that launched on February 2.

In the El Jefe glasses you will also find texturing in the temple tips and non-slip on the nose pads, which is another important component in our sunglasses. We don’t want our outdoor customer to have their glasses falling off their face, so all of our sunglasses have the rubber non-slip nose pad. It’s a life changer!

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Born of the Earth

With its line of sunglasses and snow goggles made for the outdoor adventurer, Native uses environmentally sustainable methods that involve oil from the castor bean. The caster-derived and biodegradable resin is used in both the sunglass and goggle frames, and offers a purity unrivaled by traditional ABS resin. These frames are not only more resilient and durable than petroleum, but will biodegrade in three to five years in traditional landfill conditions, compared to the 10,000 years of most standard plastics.

Also, the castor resin offers a superior strength-to-weight ratio, creating some of the lightest, strongest and most earth-friendly eyewear on the market.

A Complete Package

A respect for preserving our natural world was engineered into almost every aspect of Native Eyewear. For example, Native utilizes recycled cardboard in product packaging. The Fort goggle case is a highly functional and fully reusable storage solution that can be used for toting smaller necessities and outdoor gear. This eliminates the need for wasteful packaging, which will protect gear just as much as it will protect the earth.

Photos courtesy Native Eyewear