Mark Zuckerberg has sat at Anna Wintour’s Met Gala table. He has worn a browtfit to a Prada show. His gold chains and "Gen-Z curls" have been a headline in the Wall Street Journal. And Vanity Fair has looked into his "mystery stylist." So this guy doesn't need, like, designers to tell him how to make his AI glasses aesthetic. That’s why these glasses (made in partnership with eyewear licensor EssilorLuxottica) bear Meta’s very own logo.

Last week, Snap released their $2,200 Specs, which may as well have been designed by the same people who invented VHS tapes and priced by the same people who make Birkins. Today, Meta announced three new styles of AI glasses. The "Fury" and the "Adventurer" cost $299, while the pair made in collaboration with Kylie Jenner (they seem to be called "Starfire" but weirdly it's unclear) cost $299 (they have a rhinestone on one lens and one lens only). 

Apologies to all — this just goes with this year so hard — but welcome to the Dorky Glasses War of 2026. On one side we have Snap and Evan Spiegel. On the other side we have Meta and Mark Zuckerberg. Meta (market cap $1.4 trillion) was sure to demolish Snap (market cap $7.4 billion) before Steven Meisel snapped a fancy and expensive campaign that utterly failed to compete with Spiegel wearing the Specs on CNBC, getting his ears crushed in images Zuckerberg would probably project onto the moon for all to see if he could.  

At stake is an untold amount of money that could potentially be made from whoever can figure out how to convince all of us to essentially wear phones on our faces.

The only question is who is going to enter these Wearable Tech Hunger Games next. Open AI? Sam Altman's company has been buying Met Gala tables and got an interactive feature in the Sleeping Beauties Costume Institute exhibition, effort that can't have been for nothing. Or Anthropic? Dario Amodei hasn't manifested anywhere in a carefully chosen designer browtfit yet that I've seen, but he did cohost Graydon Carter's Cannes party.

Zuckerberg is the clear winner here, so far. His fashion sidling has paid off because, aesthetically, the new Meta glasses are not really objectionable, design-wise.

"This is the first line of glasses that we have designed from the ground up," he said in a social media video. "We partnered with Kylie," he continued (they’re first-name friends, maybe because they go to the same birthday parties and stuff). "You have a bunch of touches that Kylie put into them herself. She's such a fashion icon, that it was really fun getting a chance to work with her on this. She really wanted this gem to be embedded in the glasses. I think it's a really nice touch." 

He added, "It's almost fashion first and technology second. You integrate the technology into something that are good glasses first rather than the other way around. And when I look at others who have tried to approach the space" — cough EVAN SPIEGEL cough — "and haven't done it as well, they kind of designed the technology first and they're like yeah, let's make it look as good as possible. But as good as possible isn't good enough, it needs to be great glasses first."

He is right. Maybe — and I mean this in all seriousness — he knows this because he's been to the Met Gala and the Prada show.

I have never worn these glasses or the ones Meta previously made with Ray-Ban (which can run $500) and it's not entirely clear to me what these glasses actually DO or why they should be considered essential for anyone who likes #cool glasses. But it sounds like they talk to you (the Kylie ones have her voice in case someone wants that?). An Engadget writer asked them to translate a sign in Arabic and play music for her and it sounds like they executed those tasks successfully.

Meta says in a release that "your AI glasses will deliver smarter answers on everything from sports scores to local restaurant picks, better understand what you’re seeing, and help manage your daily life effortlessly — whether you’re building healthy habits, managing your calendar, or navigating a busy schedule hands-free." So does Kylie chime in when you're making breakfast to tell you to replace that dairy for arugula? Or will they sign Gwyneth Paltrow up to do that herself?

I clearly missed whatever product try-on event Meta may have had (wonder why). But I am willing to buy these in order to report back here for you all in Back Row.

Thoughts?

Miuccia Prada Blasts 'Useless Design'

Miuccia Prada seems tired. This is easy to understand as all of us are tired. 

She talked to Vogue at her spring 2027 men's show:

Who do we think she’s talking about here? Matières Fécales, which put prosthetics on their models’ faces to make pointed commentary on rich face surgeries? Schiaparelli, which loves ornamental nipples? Margiela, where models walked the runway with wire mouth openers?

However, one could accuse Prada’s Spring/Summer menswear show of following the same trope. (I have come to view the Matières Fécales show as a brilliantly subversive work of performance.) 

Prada previously told CNN’s Rachel Tashjian:

Well that’s one way to end up seating Mark Zuckerberg on your front row. 

The men’s spring 2027 Prada collection she and Raf Simons presented at Milan Men’s Fashion Week was built around denim. Prada told reporters she never has and never would wear jeans, but Simons has just started doing so after 20 years in wool trousers. (As a denim lover, I’m glad one of the preeminent designers of our time has realized what the fuss is all about.) He compared the show to “pasta pomodoro” backstage, as if to say, sometimes you want something fancy, but other times you just want something basic and comforting.

Simons and Prada sent pants in a skinny five-pocket style down the runway in yellow leather, green leather, turquoise leather, ugly-on-purpose prints, hot pink, sheer white — ignoring the blue denim version that made the five-pocket jean one of the most wearable garments ever. 

Simons told reporters backstage that fashion these days isn’t for the street — it’s for social media and attending runway shows. (Facts: checked ✅.) And he wanted to show REAL fashion that can be worn out and about, mixed up and styled in clever ways in everyday contexts. And so we arrive at sheer pants and all-white Canadian tuxedos.

While I like the spirit of the idea — clothes that are meant to exist on human beings off-runway — I struggle to imagine a last-minute run for milk that calls for this collection. These clothes are meant for those whose lives include regular exposure to infinity pools and yachts, helipads and F1 races. Rich people don't exist on the "streets" anymore (this is well-documented). 

Do Prada’s novelty denim-inspired styles have a "point," or are these, too, useless decoration for rich shoppers? 

Over to Thom Browne...  

Thom Browne put on a show of his usual extreme whimsy, inspired by A Bug’s Life (he watched it recently on a plane, bless). He told Vogue he “wanted people to almost be reintroduced to the reason why you come to me… structured tailoring, structured outerwear, and then, of course, the pairings of the bottoms that go along with that.” It's an interesting counterpoint to what Prada showed. He's selling a formula and a signature, which seems like a smart way to go in an age when people can get pretty great clothes secondhand or on the rapidly expanding rental market, making novelty clothing harder to sell.

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