Curated Optics Ownership and the Question of Transparency

It is a belief that independent eyewear deserves a voice in an industry increasingly shaped by licensing agreements, corporate ownership and safe commercial decisions. It is a belief that creativity should be rewarded, that extraordinary brands deserve to be discovered, and that opticians should be free to choose products because they inspire them, not because they are backed by the largest marketing budgets.

That mission is also the reason I have always welcomed new voices. The eyewear industry benefits from debate. It benefits from people asking uncomfortable questions and challenging accepted wisdom. New perspectives keep the industry alive, and independent voices often have a way of spotting things that larger organisations overlook.

That is why Curated Optics immediately caught my attention. I didn’t know who was behind it and in all honesty, that never really bothered me. What mattered to me was the message. Here was a voice speaking passionately about independent eyewear. Questioning industry habits. Highlighting brands outside the mainstream conversation. Encouraging people to think beyond the obvious.

While we certainly didn’t agree on everything, I believed we were ultimately moving in the same direction. Trying to save the world from mediocre eyewear.

From the outside, they appeared to be a fresh independent voice, championing creativity, craftsmanship and independent brands. It curated brands, selected stories and shaped conversations around the industry. Sure, they leaned heavily on AI for their articles, but these days, which magazine doesn’t. It certainly looked like the kind of platform I have spent years encouraging people to discover.

My assumption, of course, was that the curator stood apart from the brands it curated. Much of the recent scrutiny stems from questions about whether that assumption was always justified.

I thought they deserved attention. In fact, I thought it deserved enough attention that I wrote an article about it for another European optical publication. The article had already been submitted and gone to print. Then someone sent me a link….

It was an investigative report published by The Eyewear Audit. Suddenly, I found myself reading a very different story. A story that questioned the platform’s independence and raised allegations regarding ownership, commercial relationships, domain registrations, hosting records, and possible connections to brands featured on the platform.

The more I read, the more I realised that the discussion was no longer about the brands they featured. It was about who was behind the platform, how it operated, and whether readers had been given the full picture.

Recently, that scrutiny has only intensified. Additional reports and discussions have continued to examine Curated Optics, its ownership, its relationships, and whether the platform is as independent as many readers originally believed.

Whether every allegation ultimately proves accurate is not for me to decide. Those claims deserve to be examined carefully, fairly, and with the same standards of evidence we should expect from anyone claiming to speak on behalf of the industry.

What interests me is not the allegations themselves, but what they reveal about trust. Because the problem is not that someone may have an agenda. Every publication has one. TEFmag certainly does.

For years, I have openly advocated for independent eyewear. I believe optical stores become stronger when they differentiate themselves from the chain around the corner. I believe creativity deserves a place in our industry. I believe independent brands help keep the optical world interesting.

I have never hidden those beliefs. The difference is that readers know exactly what my agenda is. More importantly, they know exactly who is speaking. My name is on this magazine. My face is on this magazine.

People see me walking the halls of MIDO, SILMO, Opti, 100% Optical, and countless other trade shows around the world. Brands know who they are speaking to. Readers know who is writing. Advertisers know where they stand.

You may agree with my opinions or disagree with them completely. But at least you know where they come from. That transparency is the foundation of trust.

I have never believed that journalism requires perfect neutrality. Every publication sees the world through its own lens. Every editor carries certain beliefs, experiences and convictions into the stories they choose to tell. That is simply human nature. What matters is not pretending those influences do not exist. What matters is being honest about them.

Readers should know who is speaking to them. They should understand where opinions come from, what experiences have shaped them, and what interests may be involved. Once that information is on the table, readers are perfectly capable of making up their own minds.

As for me, there is no mystery. I am a former eyewear designer approaching my fiftieth birthday, with more than twenty-five years of experience creating eyewear collections for over sixty-five brands. I have worked with independent dreamers, ambitious entrepreneurs, and large corporate players. Those experiences shaped the lens through which I view this industry. They are the reason I continue to champion independent eyewear, question conventional thinking, and occasionally challenge the status quo.

That perspective is visible in every article I write, and I believe it should be. Readers deserve to know who is speaking to them, what experiences have shaped their opinions, and why they see the industry the way they do. Transparency does not weaken an argument. It strengthens it by allowing readers to understand where it comes from.

Without that transparency, even the strongest argument becomes more difficult to trust. The moment people begin asking who is really behind a message, they stop focusing on the message itself. Looking back, perhaps that is what appealed to me most about this curating platform.

I believed I had discovered another advocate for independent eyewear. Another publication willing to challenge assumptions, ask difficult questions, and shine a spotlight on brands that might otherwise be overlooked. In many ways, it felt like a platform pursuing a mission not entirely different from my own.

That is why the recent scrutiny surrounding Curated Optics caught my attention. By the time I received the investigation, I had already accepted the platform at face value. I had already written about it. I had already introduced it to others as a publication worth paying attention to. Had I remembered to press a button a few days earlier, Curated Optics would have been featured in my “Be Sure to Follow” section before any of these questions ever crossed my mind.

The questions being raised today are therefore not just questions for Curated Optics. They are questions I found myself asking as well. There is an irony in all of this.

Curated Optics built its reputation by examining brands, highlighting emerging voices, questioning industry norms and encouraging readers to look beyond the obvious. In doing so, it positioned itself as a curator of conversations within the eyewear industry.

The questions being asked by skilled eyewear journalists as Clodagh Norton are the same questions every publication eventually might face, once it acquires influence and authority. Who is speaking? What interests are involved? How independent is the voice shaping the discussion? And how transparent are the relationships behind it? Perhaps that is exactly how it should be.

The rise of platforms like these is, in many ways, a positive development for our industry. For years, the eyewear conversation was dominated by a relatively small number of voices. Today, anyone with enough passion, knowledge and persistence can build an audience, influence discussions and introduce readers to ideas that might otherwise go unnoticed.

That diversity of perspectives is healthy. It encourages debate, challenges assumptions and prevents any single voice from becoming the sole authority on what matters. At the same time, influence creates responsibility.

The larger an audience becomes, the more important transparency becomes. Readers naturally want to understand who is shaping the conversation they are being asked to trust. They want to know who is speaking, what interests may be involved and whether the relationships behind a platform align with the image being presented publicly.

Those are the questions currently being asked about Curated Optics and their connection to the Romanian eyewear brand The Other Glasses. Some may ultimately prove to be based on misunderstandings. Others may reveal information that readers feel should have been disclosed from the beginning. At this stage, I do not know where that process will end.

What I do know is that questions surrounding transparency rarely disappear on their own. They are answered through openness, clarity and a willingness to address concerns directly.

Time will ultimately determine which parts of the current debate matter and which do not. Until then, the discussion itself serves as a reminder that trust is one of the most valuable assets any publication can possess, and one of the easiest to lose when readers feel they are not seeing the complete picture.