Les Monts | From Concept to Saks Fifth Avenue
PROJECT BRIEF:
Design and launch a limited edition handcrafted eyewear collection under the Les Monts label — from initial concept through retail distribution. The objective was to identify an underserved customer segment, develop a product that addressed a clear market gap, and prove product market fit through strategic retail partnerships and organic consumer adoption.
PROJECT DESCRIPTION:
I conceived, designed, and launched Les Monts — a sculptural, handcrafted eyewear brand built on the belief that mass production had stripped eyewear of its soul. Starting from a clear user insight — that style-forward customers wanted eyewear with craft, story, and meaning — I developed a limited edition collection where every frame is made by hand, ensuring no two are exactly alike. I defined the brand positioning, product language, and go-to-market strategy, securing placement at Saks Fifth Avenue and Selima Optique — one of New York City's most prestigious independent eyewear boutiques, known exclusively for carrying collections that push the artform forward. The collection has since been worn organically by Kevin Hart and Mark Wahlberg. Les Monts proved that the right product, built with genuine intention and a clear point of view, doesn't need a marketing budget to find its audience.
CLIENT
Les Monts
YEAR
2024 - Present
SKILL SETS:
*Product Strategy
*User Research & Empathy
*Market Segmentation
*Pain Point Identification
*Product Positioning
*Go-to-Market Strategy
*0 to 1 Product Development
*Brand Strategy
*Retail Distribution
Les Monts means "the mountains" in French.
A mountain is not conquered quickly. It demands patience, precision, and an unwillingness to compromise. Every ascent is a succession of deliberate steps — each one necessary, none of them accidental. The path is long. The work is exacting. And it is only at the summit, after every process has been honored and every detail attended to, that something truly beautiful reveals itself.
This is how we make our frames.
Each one is the product of hours of handwork — shaping, refining, finishing — a slow and strenuous journey from raw material to the object you hold in your hands. There are no shortcuts. There is no assembly line. There is only the maker, the material, and the time it takes to do it right.
01 MISSION
The eyewear industry had lost something. Somewhere between scaling production and chasing margin, the craft disappeared. Frames became commodities — indistinguishable, forgettable, disposable. Customers were sitting on their glasses and barely noticing.
Les Monts was built on a different belief entirely.
Too many brands had chosen mass production over meaning. Customers who cared about craft, quality, and story had nowhere to go in eyewear. They could find handmade goods in furniture, fashion, and ceramics — but eyewear had largely abandoned the artisan tradition. Les Monts existed to fill that void. Not with a louder logo or a bigger marketing budget — but with a product so beautiful and so human that customers would be devastated to lose it. Eyewear that people would value not just for what it looked like, but for what it meant.
Brand Mission:
Les Monts exists to prove that eyewear can be more than a product. Each frame is handcrafted with intention — carrying the warmth, imperfection, and life of the hands that made it.
02 GOAL
Les Monts was a brand new venture built from scratch — a true MVP. There was no existing distribution, no established customer base, no proof that the market would respond to handcrafted limited edition eyewear at a luxury price point.
The goal was not revenue. The goal was not scale. The goal was proof — proof that the right customer existed, that they would find Les Monts, and that they would value it the way it deserved to be valued.
Lifecycle stage: New product → Prove PMF
Product Goal:
Les Monts exists to prove that eyewear can be more than a product. Each frame is handcrafted with intention — carrying the warmth, imperfection, and life of the hands that made it.
03 USERS
Les Monts was not built for everyone. It was built for a specific kind of person — someone who notices things. Someone who has already opted out of loud logos and mass market goods in other areas of their life, and was waiting for eyewear to catch up.
User Segments
Modified Product Goal Statement:
The goal of Les Monts is to prove product market fit with style-forward individuals who have deliberately opted out of mainstream eyewear — by giving them a handcrafted frame with a story worth telling, as a means of bringing soul and craft back to the eyewear experience.
04 PAIN POINTS
User journey for a style-forward individual shopping for eyewear:
Two pain points scored 6. Applying the funnel tiebreaker — “everything looks the same” is the highest in the funnel. If a customer can't find eyewear that feels genuinely different at the browse stage, no downstream consideration matters. They won't pick up the frame, they won't feel the craft, they won't hear the story.
Focus Pain Point:
The eyewear market had become homogenous. Style-forward customers who valued craft and story in every other area of their life had nowhere to turn in eyewear. Everything looked the same. Everything felt the same. Nothing had a soul.
Modified Product Goal Statement:
The goal of Les Monts is to prove PMF by giving style-forward customers a frame so visually and physically distinctive that they stop mid-browse and ask: what is that — and who made it?
05 SOLUTIONS
Solution 1: Premium Mass Market Brand Build — a premium eyewear brand with high quality materials and strong aesthetic direction — but at scale, using standard manufacturing processes.
Three directions considered in building Les Monts:
Solution 2: Handcrafted Limited Edition Collection — Build a truly handcrafted, limited edition eyewear brand where every frame is made by hand — sculptural, intentional, and deeply personal. Production is limited by nature. Every frame carries the mark of its maker.
Solution 3: Bespoke Custom Eyewear Service — Offer fully custom made-to-order frames for individual customers — complete personalization at the highest price point.
Eliminated Solution 1: A premium mass market brand solves for quality but not soul. The pain point wasn't price — it was sameness. A better version of what already exists doesn't address the core problem.
Eliminated Solution 3: Bespoke customization is operationally complex, expensive to deliver at quality, and limits reach. It serves a very small market and makes organic discovery and word of mouth nearly impossible.
*Chosen solution: Handcrafted Limited Edition Collection
The handcrafted approach was not just a product decision — it was a philosophical one. Every element of Les Monts was designed to carry meaning:
• Each frame is sculpted and finished by hand — giving it a warmth and tactility that no machine can replicate
• Limited production means no two frames are mass distributed — owning Les Monts means owning something rare
• The handcrafting process introduces natural variation — subtle differences that make each frame genuinely unique
Beauty in the imperfection.
Due to the handmade nature of every Les Monts frame — no two are exactly alike. That is not a flaw.
06 METRICS
Since Les Monts was a new brand proving PMF — the North Star measures whether the right customers found the brand, valued it, and came back.
North Star Metric →
I chose this as my North Star because proving PMF requires two things — proof that customers found genuine value, and proof that value is sustainable. A customer who returns to Les Monts within 24 hours of first contact didn't just notice the product — they were drawn back to it. That's the signal.
DAU who returned to purchase or engage with Les Monts within 24 hours of first contact
Secondary Metrics - Product Health
Supply side — creator/brand health:
Number of new frames introduced per collection drop
Average production time per frame — are we protecting handcraft integrity?
Wholesale sell-through rate — are retail partners seeing demand?
Demand side — customer health:
Average time spent on site per visit
Number of product pages viewed per session
Wishlist or save rate — are customers returning to consider before purchasing?
Social shares and organic tags per collection drop
Depth of engagement:
Average order value — are customers buying one frame or multiple?
Net Promoter Score — are customers recommending Les Monts unprompted?
Press and editorial mentions per collection — is the brand building cultural momentum?
• Discount rate — if we are discounting to drive sales, we are eroding the brand. This should never happen.
• Return rate — are customers receiving what they expected? Returns signal a gap between story and product.
• Wholesale vs. direct to consumer mix — are we protecting brand equity by controlling distribution?
• Retail sell-through rate — are our retail partners seeing consumer demand or sitting on inventory?
Counter Metrics - Ecosystem Health
Guardrail Metric
* If average production time per frame decreases by more than 15% from baseline — we are compromising the handcrafting process. That is the line we do not cross.
The primary risk of scaling Les Monts is diluting what makes it special. If production increases beyond the capacity of genuine handcrafting — the soul of the product disappears. The guardrail is production integrity.07 OUTCOME
Les Monts proved product market fit in the most meaningful way possible — not through paid placement or manufactured buzz, but through genuine recognition from the most discerning buyers and wearers in the world.
RETAIL VALIDATION
Les Monts is carried at Saks Fifth Avenue — one of the most prestigious luxury retail destinations in the United States. And at Selima Optique in New York City — one of the most respected independent eyewear boutiques in the world, known specifically for carrying independent collections that innovate and capture the true artform of eyewear. Getting onto that shelf is not a transaction. It is an endorsement.
CELEBRITY RECOGNITION
Kevin Hart and Mark Wahlberg have both been photographed wearing Les Monts — organically, without paid partnership or gifting expectation. In luxury goods, organic celebrity adoption is the highest possible signal. It means the product reached people with unlimited options and they chose it.
THE MEASURE THAT MATTERS
The goal was never to build the biggest eyewear brand. It was to build the most meaningful one. To make something so beautiful and so human that customers would be devastated to lose it.
