Andy Dixon partners with Vancouver-based eyewear brand Dutil on new limited-edition release
Credit to Author: Aleesha Harris| Date: Wed, 09 Oct 2019 18:00:56 +0000
Andy Dixon‘s new collaboration with the Vancouver-based eyeglasses brand, Dutil Eyewear, was limited. As in, 20 pairs-kind of limited.
“It is a sort of an insanely limited edition,” Dixon says with a laugh. In fact, the glasses were largely sold out via pre-order well before the Sept. 30 drop date.
“When we teased the launch three months ago, it said ‘coming soon,’ and there were like 10 people emailing about it asking to buy it,” Eric Dickstien, the founder of the premium eyewear company, explains. It’s safe to say that the remainder of the eyeglasses, which retailed for $998 each, were snapped up shortly thereafter.
Andy Dixon wears the glasses he co-designed with Dutil Eyewear.
But, while Dixon says Dickstien was the “numbers guy” in the deal, tackling the difficult decision of how many frames would be created for their collaboration, when it came to choosing the colours for the design, Dixon says the decision was a decidedly easy one to make.
“As soon as he mentioned the project I already had the colour palette in mind,” Dixon says of the design, which builds off a popular, made-in-Japan design in Dutil’s latest lineup designed by Dickstien, with forest green acetate, a pink polarized sunglass clip and gold-plated titanium accents. “It’s one of my favourite colour combinations that I use all the time — that kind of dark, jewel-tone green, with a kind of candy pink and gold.”
Dixon says the colours can be spotted in most, if not all of his paintings, with at least “a kiss” of the colours showing up somewhere or other on the canvas. Usually, though, he features them predominately. In fact, the cheery pink, has become so ubiquitous in the North Vancouver-born, now Los Angeles-based artist’s work, that the hue can easily be considered a signature of Dixon’s.
So, are we at the point yet where we can expect to see an “Andy Dixon Pink” marketed throughout the art world? While the suggestion elicited an enthusiastic laugh from Dixon, he said he’s not making moves to make that colour story become a reality just yet. Although, he doesn’t exactly hate the idea.
“I would love that,” Dixon says with a laugh. “I want to be the next person to copyright a colour. I think it has only been done maybe five times in history. So, I think, maybe I should get some lawyers involved.”
All hue hypotheticals aside, though, Dixon admits that, while settling on the colour selects was an easy task, deciding where to put said shades on a ‘canvas’ that’s decidedly smaller than what he’s accustomed to working on, proved to be a more tricky task.
“There’s not much surface area for colour in eyewear,” Dixon says. “So, we came up with the idea of the clips to make the pink an option for a pop of colour.”
As soon as he saw the completed glasses, Dixon knew he’d made the right choice. Why? Well, because he loved them.
“I was, at least, really confident that I knew I would like them. Whether or not they were going to be successful in other broader segment than that (laughs) I didn’t really think about, to be honest. I never really do,” he says.
Dixon’s use of colour for the design left Dickstien, a 23-year veteran of the premium eyewear industry, suitably impressed.
“He made me think about colour in a completely different way in eyewear,” Dickstien, who is also the owner of the Vancouver-based boutiques Dutil Denim and Durant Sessions, says. “I could show you that same exact frame in a different colour format, and it does not even touch to the premium-luxury essence that this piece has.”
Eric Dickstien (pictured at left) and Andy Dixon.
In addition to the frames, each pair was packaged within a leather case featuring a miniature version of one of Dixon’s celebrated paintings and a pink cleaning cloth. Each frame was numbered for authenticity.
“Everything, from the packaging, down to the nuances of the frame … you can’t do better than what he chose,” Dickstien says. “It’s what his artwork is, in actual form.”
The collaboration eyewear design depicts the perfect balance between practical fashion piece and art, according to the designer. Though, he’s not so sure how ‘practical’ they will prove in his own, personal eyewear collection.
“I’m buying mine as a showpiece, and I’m never going to do anything with them,” Dickstien admits. “I like them too much to actually wear. I just want to keep it.”
But Dixon hopes that the rest of the eyeglasses end up being worn — and enjoyed — rather than being treated like precious pieces of art.
“They’re a functioning object they’re not intended to be an art piece. They are an art piece in the same way that a designer shirt is an art piece,” Dixon says. “I don’t really believe much in buying functioning objects and not using them. I make these objects to be used.
“I’d much rather be walking down the street and see a pair of these glasses on someone’s face than go over to someone’s house for dinner and see them under glass.”
Dixon, of course, is used to seeing his creations treated like fine art hanging in galleries. That’s because it is. And it does.
A celebrated painter with commissions in Asia, Europe and beyond, Dixon has become renowned for his colourful works — most recently collaborating with the Italian fashion house Versace for a project that included a nine-foot-tall Versace shirt on display at the brand’s Palazzo in Via Gesù, Milan.
But, he assures fans that he’s still happy to reconnect with his hometown — and its other homegrown talents, like Dickstien.
“I’ve been living in (Los Angeles) for a few years now, and I’m definitely loving it, but there’s always this thing about your hometown,” Dixon says. “I mean, I lived there for 30 years. So, it is home. And I’ll eventually return, I’m sure.
“It really just feels good to be a part of Vancouver culture.”