Leave it to a company like Costa to produce awesome polarized sunglasses with something as impactful as discarded fishing net material.
Now this is cool.
When there's an abundance of wasted fishing nets, the ocean (and as a result, the world) has a pretty serious problem. Unless somebody or something comes around to repurpose that fishing net material, there's a whole lot of cause-and-effect issues that are going to impact us more than most realize.
Fishing nets truly are the most harmful form of ocean plastic, accumulating 10% of all ocean plastic pollution. The most shocking figure? The amount grows by an estimated 640,000 tons every year.
That's why I'm so intrigued and impressed by what Costa Sunglasses is doing with their latest line of polarized sunglasses. Costa's widely known as a fantastic producer of high class shades, and will forever be synonymous with the "required gear" lists of fishermen everywhere. When we got an invitation to a special sneak peek at some new sunglasses, I cursed myself for not living closer to Venice for the food, drinks, and live music promised by the event's description.
That alone is pretty awesome, but despite my slim chances of convincing the wife I needed to hop on a plane, I still had my ear to the ground, wanting to hear more about what went into making these shades. Costa was more than happy to provide more info and exclusive photos, therefore we knew we needed to pass it along to you.
The new Untangled Collection is putting discarded fishing nets to great use, while raising awareness for one of the bigger problems facing today's oceans. When a brand puts their passion behind their products, good things happen, and it would appear as though Costa has produced yet another good thing.
The company is partnering with Bureo, one of the pioneering organizations in recycled fishnet products, to transform the thrown-away fishing nets into sunglass frames that carry the same quality and style Costa is known for. The process involves recycled and cleaned nets from the coast of Chile, which are shredded and fed through a pelletizer, a machine that melts and cuts the nets into small recycled pellets. After that the pellets are injected into steel molds to form the frames of Costa's sunglasses.
According to the official press release, the new collection will be available at retailers nationwide and online in late May.
"Healthy oceans have always been a crucial part of our core mission at Costa," said Holly Rush, CEO of Costa Sunglasses. "The Untangled Collection is helping to raise awareness and provide a solution to keep discarded fishing nets from being lost in our oceans each year. Through this important program, we will also help Bureo scale and replicate its net collection program to a growing number of fishing communities."
It goes right along with their wider goal represented by their #KickPlastic campaign, a genuine commitment to "preserving our watery world." Anyone who can't get behind that should have their head examined.
Here are the frames, which come in men's/unisex (Pescador and Baffin) and women's (Victoria and Caldera) styles.
See them all, along with the rest of Costa's sunglasses, apparel, and inside info on this and their other cool initiatives, at CostaDelMar.com.
NEXT: BEHIND THE SCENES OF THOSE CRAZY COSTA SUNGLASSES SCULPTURES [VIDEO]
