“Eyes are just jelly,” my friend remarked as I wandered through the woods with a hand covering the eye with the scratched cornea. Often, the thing that we least worry about protecting is the most vulnerable; in this case our eyes definitely get ignored. It took me years to finally learn to wear protective glasses, and then more years to refine what makes good protective eyewear for the woods; in a nutshell, 1) good optics, 2) comfort, 3) interchangeable lenses for different conditions, and 4) scratch resistance. And given those criteria, no eyewear I’ve ever tried matches the Revision Eyewear Sawfly.
Revision Eyewear is a company that deals with problems that most of us will never know. They design and manufacture eyewear for the military, and are concerned with little things like keeping bullets and shrapnel out of wearers’ eyes. Branches? Child’s play. Insects? You’ve gotta be kidding. Pellets fired from a shotgun? Ah, now you’re talking. Revision Sawfly Glasses are tough. The polycarbonate is thick, and treated with a scratch-resistant coating; I’ve worn them through all sorts of thick brush, thorns, large branches, without any sign of scratching. The glasses are curved to follow the shape of your face and protect from side impacts. Interchanging lenses is a breeze…each lens comes with its own nosepiece, so you just pop one out of the frame, pop another one in. Showing true attention to detail, the nosepiece on colored lenses is black, but for clear lenses it’s clear. Clarity of the lens is outstanding; every other clear lens I own looks tinted in comparison. Weight is so small as to be almost nonexistent; there have been times that I’ve had them on and not even been aware of it. Thanks to the large, curved lens, you can’t see the edges in your field-of-view, enhancing the feeling that they aren’t really there. They come with a strap so that you can let them hang around your neck, but I tend to push them up onto my head when I need them to be off; they sit there remarkably securely. Lenses…the Revision Sawfly U.S. Military Kit (shown above) contains smoke gray and clear. That pretty much covers any situation you’ll be in; I’ve never found a need for yellow or vermillion or anything else in any hiking situation, so you get what you need without paying for a bunch of stuff you’ll never use. Retail on the kit is $90, but several outlets online have them for $80. Either way, it’s a bargain when a trip or your eyesight are saved by having them on at the right time!
