Randolph Engineering

Jan Waszkiewicz escaped occupied Poland during WWII and flew as a navigator for the British Air Force before arriving in Boston with $50 and a set of kitchen utensils. He trained as a master machinist, met fellow Polish immigrant Stanley Zaleski, and together they set out to build tools better than any eyewear factory around them was using.

The US military noticed, and awarded Randolph a contract to build aviator sunglasses in 1982 — the same design still made today, entirely by hand, over roughly 200 steps and six weeks per pair. More than fifty years on, the company remains independently owned by the Waszkiewicz family, now in its second generation of leadership.

Part of the wider world of independent eyewear — not necessarily something we carry, but always something we’re happy to talk about.