Collaborations are everywhere. Especially on the sunglass market the combination of high quality shades with the creative visions of fashion’s most appreciated designers are doing the trick. This time the Russian eyewear brand FAKBYFAK teamed up with Belgian master of colours Walter Van Beirendonck.

FAKBYFAK x Walter Van Beirendonck TOY shades

These shades are all about boldness and diversity. They are available in 5 “skin” colours referring to our human race here on earth.

To make it even more diverse you can assemble the shades in different ways. This brings back the exciting childhood feeling of assembling colourful plastic bricks.

More about the Toy shades here.

Walter Van Beirendonck

Van Beirendonck’s career is rooted in the legendary “Antwerp Six” – maybe the most influential design pack, that also includes Martin Margiela, Dries van Noten, Ann Demeulemeester, Dirk Bikkembergs, Dirk van Saene and Marina Yee. Their generation moved Antwerp to the top of the high fashion scene.

Antwerp wasn’t exactly the talk of town before and even today their school (Royal Academy of Fine Arts) still brings out the biggest fashion master minds of our time (Demna Gavsalia, Glenn Martens, etc..)!

Impact of Fashion School

Van Beirendonck started teaching at the Academy in Antwerp in 1985 and also nurtured no other than Raf Simons for his huge career. I remember getting inspired by his bold out of the box looks while my time in fashion school (unfortunately not in Antwerp, but in Austria – that’s still not on the fashion radar).

I spent my last pocket money on one of Van Beirendonck’s iconic nipple clamp print shirts back then… too bad I lost the piece somewhere during my various relocations.

David Bowie

But back to the shades. They are inspired by punk culture from the early Seventies and their wild and colourful make-up creations. Walter decided to dedicate this style to his long time hero David Bowie!

STAY STARDUST