Claire Goldsmith: Rejuvenated Shades

In the 1960's, you could find Oliver Goldsmith Sunglasses on such stars as Grace Kelly, Audrey Hepburn, Princess Margaret and Sophia Loren. Claire Goldsmith re-launched the family business in 2005 and has invigorated the brand with quality and classic design. Now reborn for the 21st century, the label has been worn by contemporary trendsetters including Robbie Williams, Jude Law, Jessica Simpson and Gwyneth Paltrow. Behance caught up with Claire to discuss the challenges of managing a growing business, keeping an innovative edge, and embracing a steep learning curve.

Claire started her career as a Personal Assistant to the CEO of a large media company. Her ambition was to learn how to run a company. Such on-the-job training proved helpful when, five years ago, she realized a new goal to re-launch Oliver Goldsmith. With her family's moral support, she was able to make it happen. As she explains, "It's a dream coming true and it's all very exciting whilst being very educational! When my mum whimpered 'I never thought I'd see us in Vogue again!' I knew this was a great thing to have brought back."

To approach a bold idea like re-launching a company, one must 'stick with it.' Claire recalls, "I talked about it so much and I knew that the more I talked about it the more I realized that I had to do it. I dislike people that talk and never do! I also did a lot of networking; building up contacts is very important as you never know when you will need help."

A steep learning curve in a new venture is ok, so long as you take the initiative to learn. As Claire explains, "My greatest frustration was that I didn't understand everything from day one which meant that I made some mistakes. For example, manufacturing - I had to accept that I needed to know about it and just learn it as quickly as possible. I did learn from my mistakes so they didn't happen more than once."

Restraint is necessary to stay focused. "You have to compromise and know that there is always a solution to any problem. If it can't be done one way, there has to be another way. Saying that, we never compromise on creativity, just on timing. For example if something is out of our budget we will put the project on hold until we are able to afford it."

Some advice that Claire has shunned: "One piece of advice that I am happy that I never listened to was that I should put the OG logo on the side of the frames. Less is more these days!"

Some advice that Claire has followed: "One good piece of wisdom was 'while your competitors are copying you they will never be able to get ahead of you.' I liked that, as creators are always worrying about their designs being copied."

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