Retro style Marilyn sunglasses

Robert Roope is a sixty-something optician from St Albans. He's also the designer behind these 1950s inspired retro-cool sunglasses and frames.

Encouraged by his two sons, who both work at so-hip-it-hurts London ad agencies, he combined his love of specs with his love of jazzzzzzzzzzzzz.

The result of this freestyle alchemy is Retrospecs and Black Eyewear - available from the Shoreditch shop No-One. You'll find frames with names such as the (Thelonius) Monk, the (John) Coltrane, the Dizzy (Gillespie, not Rascal) among others.

It's a clever idea, and one that's bound to appeal to fashion-folk and beyond. Solid plastic frames have been enjoying a resurgence of late, the ghost of NHS glasses past having been firmly laid to rest in the irony box.

I'm putting two (jazz) hands in the air for these.

That's Nina as in Simone

And Buster as in Bailey