Warby Parker's Neil Blumenthal on Food, Fashion & Innovation
Warby Parker’s eyewear is vintage inspired, but the company’s business ethos is 21st century: online oriented, altruistic, and highly innovative. A key source of creative inspiration? Today’s food world. Eating well is so central to the WP culture, says co-founder Neil Blumenthal, “We posted our core values in the kitchen because that’s where we figured people would be exposed to them most frequently.”
1/7"We posted our core values in the kitchen because that's where we figured people would be exposed to them most frequently." Neil Blumenthal, Warby Parker co-founder (left) (Photograph by Collin Hughes)
2/7Team Building
The duo order lunch for their 300 employees several times a week: “We try to encourage as many collisions as possible in the office,” says Gilboa. The chicken parm from Parm in NYC’s Nolita is a fave.
(Photograph courtesy of Parm)
DANIEL KRIEGER PHOTOGRAPHY3/7Sustainably Cool
The carbon-neutral company has a do-gooder side, so the dinner to fête its first store was held at the farm-focused restaurant the Fat Radish. (Photograph by Daniel Krieger)
4/7Out of the Jar
The in-house Fun Committee invites local food artisans for tastings: “Hopefully, it helps spur creativity,” says Blumenthal. (Photograph courtesy of Rick's Pick's)
5/7"People are mixing flavors in ways that nobody would’ve dreamed of ten years ago," Blumenthal says. “There’s innovation unlike any point in history. That inspires us.” (Photograph courtesy of Warby Parker)
6/7Glass Act
WP made this tray for Eleven Madison Park guests who forget their reading glasses. (On the roof at sibling restaurant The NoMad, it’s sunglasses.) (Photograph by Jacob Romoser)
7/7Food/Service
The founders get ideas from restaurateurs like Danny Meyer. “We look at retail as a form of hospitality,” says Blumenthal. (Image courtesy of Harpercollins Publishers)
