This Thing's Everywhere: DMY Studios' '90s-Inspired Sunglasses

Do you ever recognize a product before you know — or even can name — the brand that makes it? In “This Thing’s Everywhere,” we delve deep into these ubiquitous pieces and the impact they have on the businesses of their creators.

In this day and age, virality is king. The right celebrity placements can launch an unknown brand into super stardom. This is precisely the story behind cult-followed British sunglasses brand DMY Studios. Its minimalist, ’90s-inspired frames are frequently seen on fashion’s heaviest hitters — Taylor Russell, Sydney Sweeney, Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, Olivia Rodrigo and Laura Harrier are just a few recent examples — and founder Demi Yip says her success is a testament to her product.

“We’ve never paid for a placement,” Yip tells Fashionista. Though not unheard of, this is certainly rare in an era of many pay-to-play arrangements. “So many people have asked me, how much do you pay to get these placements? And I’m like, do you honestly think I could afford these placements? These are the world’s leading, top-tier VIP celebrities. There’s no chance.”

Originally named DMY by DMY, Yip launched the brand in 2018 when she was just 21 years old. The founder had studied history at King’s College in London, where she was president of its Fashion Society. Upon graduating, the designer moved back in with her parents and cFonsidered grad school.

DMY Studios Founder, Demi Yip

“I knew I wanted to do something in fashion and design, my heart was never in the corporate world,” says Yip. “My mom was a little bit of a fashionista, so she had a lot of vintage clothes.” Yip’s husband, who owns an interior design company, encouraged her to start a brand of her own.  “He really did push me and inspire me to start my own thing,” says Yip. “So I sat [on my parents’ sofa] and I thought for quite a long time, what am I going to do?”

She started researching handbags but found it “intimidating,” and then moved on to eyewear. “I immediately had tunnel vision with it,” she recalls. “I just felt like there weren’t any other sunglasses brands out there at the time, no independent eyewear brands that were creating nice, timeless, trans-seasonal eyewear at more of an affordable price point.”

Drawing inspiration from vintage fashion, Yip gravitated to the minimalism of ’90s accessories, which is reflected in her on-trend, but also timeless, designs. “I never wanted to create something that had a short lifespan. I wanted sustainable capsule accessories for the modern woman,” says Yip.

She found a CAD designer to help engineer the frames she envisioned and used her mother’s house as a makeshift headquarters. The first collection included five styles, some of which are still the brand’s best-sellers.

“We launched our website in August 2018, and I remember thinking the sales weren’t rolling in on the first day, and I was like, what’s happened here?” Yip recalls. She admits she had spent most of her time on design and branding, leaving marketing as an afterthought. “I think that that was probably the first point at which I began realizing, okay, you’ve really got to work at it,” Yip says. So, she did.

“I obviously didn’t have the budget for a PR agency, I didn’t even know that a PR agency existed at the time,” Yip explains. “So I basically just began thinking about who I visualized DMY on and who I thought would be the right girl for us to align ourselves with. I researched their inner circles, their assistants, their stylists, their friends, and I just started cold emailing them. I put together a lookbook on Canva myself, and I just started pitching the brand. And I did this for about five months, I’d say, and I wasn’t getting any responses. I remember I was really downbeat about it.”

After a few months of seeding and with a modest 5,000 Instagram followers, the brand got a promising request: A buyer from Urban Outfitters wanted to stock DMY’s sunglasses on its online store. “That was one of the first pieces of actual industry validation, that a buyer from Urban had recognized the brand, that was amazing,” says Yip.

Shortly after that, in April of 2019, Yip gifted all five pairs of her sunglasses to stylist Mimi Cuttrell. “Her assistant replied saying, ‘Mimi loves them, and we’ve got a fitting with Gigi [Hadid] next week,'” recalls Yip. “I remember thinking, ‘Gigi’s never going to wear my sunglasses’, so I sent them with very low expectations.” But then, a couple of days later, Yip’s sister spotted Gigi’s sister, Bella, wearing the frames online.”I was thinking, ‘it can’t be.’ Bella Hadid wore the Olsen brown sunglasses with a brown leather outfit at the Variety’s Power Of Women Gala in New York in April, I remember the outfit to this day,” says Yip. 

Bella Hadid wearing the Olsen sunglasses in 2019 and again in 2024. 

“That’s a pinch me moment. And I think from that point forward, Mimi was always, and still is today, our biggest supporter.” The next week, Gigi Hadid wore the Valentina frame in Ivory.” According to Yip, Gigi still wears her old samples today. “Whenever I see her in them now, I always zoom in and you can’t see the logo on the lens, so I know it was a very first batch, which again is testament to the fact that they’re durable and comfortable.”

As far as celebrity endorsements translating to sales goes, Yip says, “Bella Hadid converts really, really well. She wore the Olsen in brown and our Shopify sold out within 24 hours. Then Kendall [Jenner] started wearing the Valentina in Havana, then those were our best-seller until she started wearing the Billy in black, then that became our best-seller. Then, in October, Hailey and Justin [Bieber] started wearing the Romi in black so then that was our bestseller for a long time.”

Today’s best-sellers include the Olsen frame in dark gray, thanks once again to Bella Hadid, as well as the Margot in black, which Huntington-Whiteley has been sporting recently. 

Kendall Jenner wearing the Valentina sunglasses in Havana in 2021, and the Billy sunglasses in black in 2022. 

DMY’s frames run between $200 and $300 and are hand-crafted from Italian cellulose acetate sourced from a family-run company called Mazzucchelli that’s been in business since 1849. “Mazzucchelli’s premium acetate is renowned in the eyewear market for its rich luster,” explains Yip. “It’s lightweight, flexible, and it’s hypoallergenic material made from cotton fibers and wood pulp, so not plastic or anything like that.”

The founder spent time finding the best premium options for every detail, from the reinforced hinges to scratch- and shatter-resistant lenses. “I wanted to make sure that they were the best quality that they could be, and I feel very passionately about that,” she tells Fashionista.

Following Cuttrell’s co-sign, stylists were reaching out left and right, says Yip, resulting in organic placements on the likes of Priyanka Chopra, Irina Shayk and Stella Maxwell, and Jenner in the summer of 2021.

“Because of all the celebrity placements, we started getting noticed by other stores. Browns messaged us, then we were stocked in Browns. And then we partnered with a global sales agency to help scale the business,” says Yip. From that point forward, buyers flocked to DMY and world-renowned retailers including Liberty London, Selfridges, Ssense, LuisaViaroma and Moda Operandi joined its list of stockists.

By 2024, the designer felt like the brand had evolved from its youthful footing into something more elevated, warranting a re-brand.

“When I initially started DMY by DMY, I was 21. It was more of a contemporary sunglasses brand,” Yip reflects. “We were in Urban Outfitters, we were mostly street-style. But as things evolved, we started to take on more of a quiet luxury, sophisticated, refined kind of minimalistic look, and I just felt like the old logo, the old branding didn’t really resonate anymore.”

Judging by the brand’s success, one might be surprised that its team is still fewer than five people, including Yip’s sister who’s the operations manager. “We’re a really, really small company, but we outsource a lot of our operations,” notes Yip.

DMY Studios now boasts 23 SKUs of frames and more than 30,000 Instagram followers. As far as what the future holds, the brand has plans to expand its accessories offering into new categories, so stay tuned.

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Source: Fashionista.com