17 Eyewear Brands Like Moscot for Timeless Frames
A LEMTOSH costs $340 on Moscot's own site, and every one of its 105 size and colour variants was in stock when we looked. That's the problem with loving Moscot. Nothing about it changes, and after your second pair you start wondering who else cuts acetate this well.
Moscot is a five-generation family-owned New York eyewear brand, and its Shopify storefront trades under the name MOSCOT NYC SINCE 1915. The LEMTOSH and the MILTZEN both sit at $340 optical, both in Italian acetate, in 32 and 19 colourways.
We checked 17 eyewear brands on their own sites this week and kept the ones with a real optical or sunglass range behind the homepage. Prices are quoted in whatever currency each shop served us, nothing converted, so USD, EUR and GBP all appear below.
Quick comparison: Closest to a LEMTOSH in shape and material: Garrett Leight, SALT. Optics, Barton Perreira and Oliver Peoples. Cheapest way in: Warby Parker and Komono. Frames you buy through an optician instead of a cart: Lindberg and Kuboraum. Sculptural picks for anyone bored of round acetate: MYKITA, Etnia Barcelona, RetroSuperFuture and Thom Browne. Ray-Ban sits on its own, cheap and unreadable.
| Brand | What it makes | Price we checked | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ray-Ban | Sunglasses and optical | Site blocked our check | Frames people recognise |
| Oliver Peoples | Sunglasses and optical | $516 to $578 USD | Quiet frames with no logo |
| Persol | Italian sunglasses | $333 to $363 USD | Italian acetate under $400 |
| Garrett Leight | Sunglasses and optical | $355 to $685 USD | California take on the round acetate |
| Cutler and Gross | Sunglasses and optical | £415 to £605 GBP | British frames made in Italy or Japan |
| Matsuda | Sunglasses and optical only | $775 USD | Japanese metalwork and engraving |
| Lindberg | Titanium optical | No prices online | Rimless frames you barely feel |
| RetroSuperFuture | Sunglasses and optical | €139 to €550 EUR | Colour, at a fraction of the luxury names |
| Ahlem | Sunglasses and optical | $150 to $790 USD | Paris-named frames in thin metal |
| Barton Perreira | Sunglasses and optical | $405 to $1,050 USD | Hollywood shapes with a fine bevel |
| Kuboraum | Acetate and metal masks | No prices online | Frames that read as sculpture |
| SALT. Optics | Sunglasses and optical | $470 to $560 USD | Japanese titanium and muted acetate |
| Komono | Sunglasses, optical, watches | €189 EUR | Two pairs for the price of one LEMTOSH |
| Thom Browne | Sunglasses, optical, clothing | $720 to $2,790 USD | Titanium at the top of the market |
| Etnia Barcelona | Sunglasses and optical | €179 to €439 EUR | Colour blocking and Barcelona references |
| MYKITA | Sunglasses and optical | $599 to $859 USD | Berlin engineering, no visible screws |
| Warby Parker | Prescription eyeglasses | From $95 USD | Buying four pairs for one Moscot budget |
Ray-Ban
Ray-Ban is the brand a Moscot shopper reaches for when the frames need to survive being sat on, and it sells both sunglasses and prescription optical. It's also the one entry here your friends will name without reading the temple.
We couldn't read a single price. Every request to ray-ban.com came back as an Akamai 403, including the robots file, from a browser user agent and through a reader proxy alike. That leaves no figure to quote and no product page we'd link, so the homepage is where we send you. The brand sits a price tier below almost everything else here, which is the reason it's on the list.
If price is what brought you, we compared its discounting habits in does Ray-Ban have sales.
Best for: a recognisable frame at a price the rest of this list doesn't reach.
Oliver Peoples
Oliver Peoples is the closest thing to Moscot's design temperament at a higher price, and the Gregory Peck Sun ($516) is the frame that proves it. It's a keyhole-bridge round in the same family as a LEMTOSH, cut a little finer, with the brand name kept off the front entirely.
Sunglasses on the US site run from $473 to $619, so a pair costs roughly half again what Moscot charges. The Cary Grant Sun ($578) is the squarer option. Both are named after actors, which tells you what the house is chasing.
The site's own copyright line reads Luxottica of America, which tells you this is a heritage label inside one of the largest eyewear groups going rather than an independent workshop. Moscot is still family-owned, and that difference shows in how the two brands talk about themselves.
Best for: a logo-free round frame with better finishing than Moscot's.
Persol
Persol is the cheapest way onto this list that still gives you Italian acetate, with sunglasses running $333 to $363 on the US site. The PO3019S sits at $333 and the PO3269S at $363, so the whole sunglass range lands inside a $30 band.
That flat pricing is the useful thing here. Choosing a Persol is about shape and lens tint, not budget, which makes it an easier first purchase than anything else in this price bracket. The house describes itself as Italian eyewear and does its own optical range alongside the sunglasses.
Against a $340 LEMTOSH you're paying about the same for a different mood, sharper and more Milanese than Brooklyn. We put it head to head with another heritage name in Persol vs Tom Ford.
Best for: Italian sunglasses at the same money as Moscot's optical frames.
Garrett Leight
Garrett Leight is the California answer to the New York round, and its catalogue is almost exactly split between the two things a Moscot shopper wants. We counted 190 listings, 73 optical and 72 sunglasses, with 969 of 1,583 variants in stock.
Eyewear runs $355 to $685 USD, with the median frame at $425. The Sherwood Sun ($455) and the Monarch optical ($395) bracket the range. Made in Japan is a category the brand puts in its own navigation, so you can filter by where a frame was made before you look at the shape.
Its site lists shops in Venice, Silver Lake, La Brea, Brooklyn, Mulberry, Hayes and Austin, so a try-on is possible without an appointment in most of those cities.
Best for: the round acetate shape with a lighter, sunnier finish than Moscot's.
Cutler and Gross
Cutler and Gross puts "since 1969" in its own site header, which makes it one of only two entries here that put a founding year on their own site. Prices come in GBP by default: the 9690 Square Sunglasses at £415, the 9261 Cat Eye limited edition at £430, and the Cranley 1425 titanium aviator at £605.
The site sorts its frames by where they were made, with Made in Italy and Made in Japan as separate browsable collections. A currency selector switches to USD, AUD or CAD, so the pound isn't a barrier for a US reader.
Compared with a $340 LEMTOSH this is a step up in money and a step sideways in mood, more London optician than Lower East Side. The Great Frog collaboration at £525 is where it gets loud.
Best for: knowing which country your frames were made in before you buy.
Matsuda
Matsuda makes nothing except eyewear, which puts it in a small group. Its catalogue is 107 products, 59 sunglasses and 48 optical, with no other category at all and 417 of 513 variants available when we checked.
Frames sit at $775 USD, with the M2075 and M2059 both at that figure. What you're paying for is metalwork: engraved temples and hand-finished detail on the kind of thin metal frame Moscot doesn't make. It's the most expensive optical option here short of Thom Browne.
The brand's old domain, matsuda-eyewear.com, no longer resolves. Its live site is matsuda.com, which self-identifies as Matsuda and carries the whole catalogue. We go deeper on its peers in brands like Matsuda.
Best for: Japanese metal frames with engraving you can see from a metre away.
Lindberg
Lindberg is one of two brands here you can't buy online at any price. Its site is a showcase with a "find a store" button and no cart, so every pair goes through an optician who fits it to your face.
That's the point of the brand. Lindberg builds in titanium and gold, both of which it lists as product categories, and its rimless frames are the lightest thing on this list by a wide margin. There's no acetate slab and no visible hinge to compare against a MILTZEN.
Because there's no online price, budget by asking your optician rather than by anything you read. Danish titanium isn't a cheaper option than a $340 Moscot, and the fitting is a separate appointment.
Best for: readers who'd trade the acetate look for a frame they stop noticing.
RetroSuperFuture
RetroSuperFuture holds the deepest eyewear catalogue on this list by a distance. Its cart quoted us euros, the median available frame is €239, and the range runs €139 to €550.
1,734 of its 1,750 listings are eyewear, against 14 apparel items, so this is an eyewear house that happens to sell a T-shirt. The Gesto sits at €169 in several colourways, the 1968 Azure at €209 and the Caro Maharishi collaboration at €229. We counted 1,200 of 1,834 variants available.
Against a $340 LEMTOSH, a Gesto is roughly half the money for a frame with more colour and less weight of history behind it. The catalogue turns over fast enough that shortlisting beats browsing. We cover its closest peers in brands like Retrosuperfuture.
Best for: colour and shape without the luxury markup.
Ahlem
Ahlem names its frames after Paris streets and neighbourhoods, and it's the best-stocked shop on this list: 756 of 827 variants were available when we checked, which is 91%.
The range splits almost evenly, 112 optical against 108 sunglasses, and prices in USD. Eyewear runs $150 to $790 with a median of $570, so the Volontaires sunglass at $550 and the Poitou at $590 sit right in the middle of the house's thinking rather than at its edges.
The shapes are finer and more Parisian than Moscot's, built around thin metal and small acetate rounds. At $570 median you're paying $230 over a LEMTOSH for a frame that reads as jewellery rather than as a statement.
Best for: thin metal frames with a Parisian reference in the name.
Barton Perreira
Barton Perreira is the Los Angeles house that dresses film characters, and it prices accordingly: eyewear runs $405 to $1,050 USD with a median of $550. The Healey and the Adrian both sit at $700, the Angelou at $520 and the Bhanot sunglass at $660.
Its catalogue is 239 eyewear listings with 810 full-price variants available, and nothing we sampled carried a struck-through comparison price, so the figures above are what you pay. Frames are listed as Frame or sunglasses with no third category, which is the shape of a specialist.
What separates it from Moscot is the edge work. These are thinner, more bevelled shapes built for a face in close-up, where a LEMTOSH is built to be seen from the other end of a bar.
Best for: film-styled shapes with a fine bevelled edge.
Kuboraum
Kuboraum calls its frames masks, and it means it. The collections are named Sun Mask and Optical Mask, alongside Machinery, Hydromechanics and Rimless, and the shapes are closer to sculpture than to anything on a Moscot shelf.
The frames are, in the brand's own words, dreamed in Berlin and handmade in Italy. There's no cart and no price anywhere on the site, only a store locator, so this is another one you buy through a retailer rather than online.
If a LEMTOSH is a frame that disappears into your face, a Kuboraum is the opposite argument. It's the entry here we'd send you to when you've owned two pairs of round acetate and want a frame that gets mistaken for nothing else.
Best for: a frame that's the loudest thing you're wearing.
SALT. Optics
SALT. Optics sits closest to Moscot on material and furthest on colour, working in muted acetates and Japanese titanium. Sunglasses run $470 to $560 USD, and acetate optical frames like the Lopez sit at $520.
The catalogue is large and moves fast: 718 listings with 277 available when we checked, so a colourway you like may not be there next month. The brand runs a 20th Anniversary collection and a Japanese Titanium collection as separate lines, both browsable from the top nav.
It ships free two-day in the US and prices in USD by default, with a country selector that covers EUR, GBP and JPY. For a $340 LEMTOSH buyer this is a $180 step up for a frame in quieter colours.
Best for: greys, greens and browns instead of black acetate.
Komono
Komono is the cheapest independent frame on this list, and it's the one entry that also sells watches, so check the category before you add to bag. Of its 1,308 listings, 650 are sunglasses and 437 are optical, with watches a distant 113.
The Corbin sunglass sits at €189 and the Ana at €69, both full price with no struck-through comparison. Its cart served us euros and accepted a Corbin Black at €189 without complaint, which is how we know the shop trades: 679 of 1,334 variants were available when we checked.
Stock reads thin if you only look at the first page of the Belgian brand's catalogue, which runs to three. Read the whole thing and half the shop is buyable. Two pairs here cost about one LEMTOSH.
Best for: buying two frames instead of agonising over one.
Thom Browne
Thom Browne is the tailoring house on this list, and its eyewear is sold direct rather than through a licence counter. The sunglasses collection alone holds 78 styles with 85 of 96 variants available, plus a separate optical range.
Prices start at $720 for the Titanium Oval and reach $2,790 for a limited-edition acetate and titanium round, with the Titanium Hector Aviator at $1,960 in between. That's two to eight LEMTOSHes per frame, so this is the top of the market rather than a Moscot alternative on price.
Titanium is the material story throughout, and the rimless aviator at $980 is where the house's proportions read clearest. If the tailoring is what drew you, the frames are a smaller way in.
Best for: titanium frames from a house that also cuts the suit.
Etnia Barcelona
Etnia Barcelona is the colour argument at a sane price, and the brand's own timeline dates itself to 2001. Frames run €179 to €439: the Avinyo 2013 at €179, the Ibiza 12 at €189, the Yokohama 2 Pink at €349 and the Casa Batlló at €439.
Names come from Barcelona streets and buildings, and the range leans into colour blocking rather than the tortoiseshell-and-black default of most heritage eyewear. It's the entry here that looks least like a Moscot and shares the most with it in construction.
One thing to get right before you search: the brand's site is etniabarcelona.com, and the near-miss etnibarcelona.com that circulates in brand lists doesn't resolve at all. Prices default to EUR, with USD, GBP and CAD in the region selector.
Best for: a Spanish frame under €200 that isn't black.
MYKITA
MYKITA titles its own site "Handmade Designer Eyewear from Berlin", and its frames use a screwless hinge that's the brand's whole engineering pitch. Sunglasses on the US-priced site run $599 to $859.
That puts it above Moscot and below Matsuda, in the band where you're paying for construction rather than a name. The Berlin workshop makes both sunglasses and prescription frames, and the site's own localisation served us USD.
The shop can be slow to settle on a region, so if the price you see isn't in your currency, set it from the localisation menu before you shortlist anything.
Best for: an engineered metal frame with no screws to lose.
Warby Parker
Warby Parker is the budget end of this list by a wide margin, with prescription eyeglasses starting at $95 USD including lenses. That's a quarter of a LEMTOSH, prescription included.
Its Home Try-On programme is the other reason it's here. You pick frames online and they arrive to try before you pay, which solves the thing that makes buying a round acetate frame online hard: you can't tell whether the bridge suits your face from a product photo.
What you give up is material depth. The frames won't feel like Italian acetate at $340, and the range is designed to be replaced rather than kept. For a first pair, or a spare, that trade reads well. Our roundup of brands like Zenni covers the same end of the market.
Best for: trying six shapes at home before spending anything.
How to Choose Your Next Pair
Start with the number. If $340 is your ceiling, Persol, Komono and Warby Parker are the three that come in at or under it, and Ray-Ban belongs in that group even though we couldn't read its prices. Above it, Garrett Leight and SALT. Optics give you the closest thing to a LEMTOSH in a different colour, and Oliver Peoples gives you the same shape finished better.
Then decide whether you want to buy online at all. Lindberg and Kuboraum both send you to an optician, which costs a trip and buys you a fitting. That's a fair trade on a frame you'll wear every day for years.
For the loud end, Etnia Barcelona and MYKITA do it at half of what Thom Browne charges. And if the round acetate shape is the whole reason you're here, our guide to brands like Cubitts is the next list to read.
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Written by
Spencer Lanoue
