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Tortoise Frames

Tortoise and havana acetate, from warm amber through to a smoke so dark it reads black until the light hits it.

48 frames

About Tortoise Frames

Fifty tortoise and havana frames are online, from eleven brands. KUBORAUM has 15 of them, Res/Rei and Sabine Be nine each, Henau and Cartier four apiece, J.F. Rey three, Oliver Peoples two, and DITA, Blake Kuwahara, Matsuda and Traction Productions one each. Forty-five are acetate, four pair acetate with metal, and one, a Cartier in Gold / Havana, is metal with a havana finish.

Tortoise is patterned acetate: a mottle of amber, brown and black cut from a solid plate, so the pattern runs through the whole rim and is the same at the temple tip as at the lens. Havana is the name many brands use for the same pattern. The pattern here runs from Sabine Be’s Blonde Tortoise and Fawn Tortoise through KUBORAUM’s Yellow Havana and Havana Grey to Cartier’s Dark Havana and Matsuda’s Dark Tortoise. Then it leaves brown behind: Henau’s Sage Havana, KUBORAUM’s Green Havana and Red Havana, two Blue Tortoises, J.F. Rey’s Purple Tortoise and Oliver Peoples’ Morado Tortoise.

Shapes and sizes

Square is the most common shape, with 13 frames, then cat-eye with eleven, round with eight, geometric with six, rectangular with five, oval with four and aviator with three. Eye sizes run from 35mm, a Traction Productions round in Blue Tortoise, to 58mm, a Henau geometric: seven frames are 46mm or under, 25 sit between 47mm and 52mm, and 18 are 53mm or more.

Most of the fifty are one of a kind, so the pattern in the photograph is the pattern you receive, not a representative sample. Each ships as a frame, free and insured within the US with a signature on delivery, for your own optician to glaze.

Do tortoise shell glasses suit every skin tone?

Close to it, because tortoise is not one colour. A blonde or fawn tortoise is light and warm; a dark havana reads almost black; a grey, green, blue or purple tortoise steps away from brown altogether. The usual advice is a warmer tortoise for warm undertones and a cooler or darker one for cool undertones, but it is advice. Send us a photo and we will suggest two or three from the fifty.

Is tortoise shell real shell?

No. None of the frames here contains any animal shell; tortoise and havana are names for a pattern in acetate, cut from a solid plate. Because it is cut rather than moulded, the mottle runs through the entire rim, and an optician can warm the frame to adjust it. Forty-five of our fifty tortoise frames are acetate throughout.

What is the difference between tortoise and havana?

Nothing in the material. Havana is the name many brands use for the same mottled acetate that English speakers call tortoise or tortoise shell. On our site both words are in the colour names as the brand wrote them: KUBORAUM says Havana, Sabine Be and Oliver Peoples say Tortoise. The tortoise page holds both.

Can I get prescription lenses in tortoise frames?

Yes. Every frame here ships as a frame, and your own optician fits the lenses. A tortoise acetate rim is thick enough to hide the edge of a stronger lens, which is one reason the pattern is so common on prescription glasses. Our lens guide at /collections/lens-guide covers the choices. If you live near one of our shops, the Eye Rx practice can glaze and adjust the frame.