My name is Leonardo Balbi and I have been working as a designer of luxury glasses for top Italian and foreign stylists for 35 years. My career history can be considered unique as I have lived one of the most important periods for this sector. I have professionally grown up between the 70's and 80's, when a revolutionary transformation was occurring. Stylists became aware that glasses were gaining more and more popularity in the fashion system image. Entrepreneurs, in their turn, realized that the cooperation with stylists held a huge growth potential for their business. Therefore, entrepreneurs and stylists entered into a lot of license agreements for the design, production and distribution of fashion glasses. I have unwittingly been the protagonist and witness of that extraordinary historical moment. The numberless possibilities provided by this new relationship between fashion and eyewear systems has triggered an unstoppable growth process. The result has been an exponential development which has involved various fields.

A partire dagli anni '70 ho trascorso 10 anni della mia vita professionale come collaboratore dipendente della Ditta Comet (oggi Allison) e questo mi ha permesso d'imparare, oltre che a progettare, anche a conoscere le varie tecniche di costruzione, partendo dalla preparazione del prototipo sino al disegno tecnico necessario per la produzione su larga scala.
Nel 1985 decisi di aprire il primo studio privato specializzato nella creazione di nuovi modelli di occhiali firmati.
Da allora ho disegnato moltissime collezioni di occhiali firmati, vivendo personalmente la storia dei vari cambiamenti stilistici che seguirono nel tempo.
Dispongo inoltre di un archivio invidiabile nel quale sono racchiuse tutte le esperienze di ogni singola collezione, nonché una raccolta d'innumerevoli occhiali vintage, dagli anni '70 ad oggi, frutto di un enorme lavoro creativo vissuto in prima persona.

Starting from the '70s, I have spent ten years of my professional life as an internal collaborator at Comet company (now Allison). During that period I learnt not only to design, but also to know the different construction techniques, from the preparation of prototypes to the technical drawing required for large-scale production.
In 1985 I decided to open my first design studio, specialized in the creation of new glasses models.
Since then, I have designed numberless collections of luxury glasses, personally living the various stylistic changes occurring over the years.
I have also gathered an enviable archive containing all the details of each single project, as well as a valuable collection of vintage glasses, from the 70's to present times, the result of a huge creative work I have personally experienced.

In my 35 years' experience, I have established a working method allowing me to master the design of entire collections. Meanwhile, I have acquired the evaluation capacity necessary to determine the right creative choices and to assess the project feasibility. This intellectual wealth is now made available to those companies which wish to offer a unique product and to develop a brand fully representing their image and identity.

BENEFIT: the use of an intellectual capital made of all the experiences and intuitions gathered in the course of time gives a real competitive advantage to the creativity of the business team. Furthermore, my professional advice leaves a rich training heritage in the form of an effective working method that the creative team can autonomously use afterwards.

Today, I offer my knowledge and experience to those companies which wish to create a unique product, by supporting them to define an exclusive and highly competitive brand.
I ensure a top quality service, capable of developing targeted solutions based on each company's specific requirements; I manage the project organization and provide the guidelines to be followed to obtain a product meeting the company's growth expectations; I promote innovative solutions to stimulate and strengthen the creative team's inspiration.

I personally deliver an advice service tailored to each company's needs, ensuring:

1. a strong support to the creative team in order to define a product style completely reflecting the brand's image;
2. the guidelines required by the company's designers to create the new collection models;
3. a valuable contribution of illustrative material (tableau) and historical products, selected from BALBI archive, to build an effective project plan.
4. project analysis aimed at a correct evaluation of the guidelines and development of new models in line with the company's business targets;
5. prototype checking to ensure the execution of new models is consistent with the original concept, as well as the ergonomic and proportional specifications.
6. qualified help in choosing the colour range and the single details for any new model, to create innovative products capable of conveying a brand image suited to market demand and fashion system expectations.