With the S/S 2024 campaign Akoni returns to its origins

The luxury eyewear brand’s Swiss chooses a pristine Alpine setting to highlight both roots and an exploration theme that is a powerful strand of the company’s singular DNA.

Over the years, Akoni has often stressed that its exceptional Swiss engineering outlook that helps to set the Lugano based company apart. And that Helvetian heritage is clearly reflected in the stunning landscapes forming the backdrop of Akoni’s Spring-Summer 2024 campaign, which was shot inside Switzerland’s spectacular Valle Verzasca. The Alpine valley’s extraordinary color palette—ranging from the dazzling emerald tint of its fast-flowing glacial stream to the rich tones of the polished rock formations—offers the perfect complement to the titanium and acetate frames of Akoni’s Collection VII, many of which echo colors of distant lunar and Martian landscapes, composed of ice, sand and volcanic rock.

The inspirations behind the campaign according to Akoni’s Creative Director Salma Rashid

“In the end, we know that it’s the elegant fractal geometry behind each of nature’s masterpieces that’s responsible for the fascinating beauty of every individual element of the Verzasca valley. And that complex numerical provenance perfectly echoes the origin of each Akoni design—since the impeccable proportions of each of our Akoni frame ultimately depend upon the golden ratio, the age-old mathematical formula utilized by Akoni’s design team. Since a powerful strand of the Akoni DNA builds upon the uplifting power of the cosmos and those legendary explorers who either lent their name to familiar constellations or dared to enter unknown universes, the Akoni team felt it was very fitting to set the latest campaign within the rugged Swiss landscape—a territory that has always inspired the most intrepid of adventurers. Collection after collection, Akoni references the audacity of celebrated trailblazers who dared to set out in search of new discoveries. Knowing that sometimes all it takes is a change in perspective in order to make the greatest of discoveries, Akoni highlights the fact that the greatest exploits are those that contain within themselves the liberating power of transformative self-revelations—since, as Marcel Proust famously noted, “the real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.”

Skyracer, Cosmo and Tiros

Artistic director Tommaso Garner worked closely with photographer Mattia Balsamini to center the campaign’s focus on three key designs from the Akoni VII collection: the Skyracer, Cosmo and Tiros. Still-life images, posed at op the Valle Verzasca’s tranquil river pools and smooth stones, spotlight the frames’ hand-crafted, one-of-a-kind embellishments, expertly created by respected Japanese artisans—including the distinctive double rims outlining the Skyracer’s lenses, the sharply sculpted acetate angles of the Cosmos frame, and the unique perforated titanium side shields and sleek, bolted custom brow bar of the Tiros. These are among the many small refinements and details, easily recognized by the discerning Akoni client, which help make clear the superior craftsmanship, impeccable design and unparalleled materials that set apart each and every Akoni frame.