'Glasses Connoisseur' Emma Chamberlain Brought the 'Nostalgia Factor' to Her New Warby Parker Collab (Exclusive)

The podcast host and fashion pro talks with PEOPLE about the inspo for her collection — and why her photo shoot stars the humble pigeon

Emma Chamberlain knows what she likes.

“If you saw my personal glasses collection, you'd honestly be concerned for me,” she tells PEOPLE exclusively, right after getting on a Zoom call to chat through her brand new Warby Parker collaboration, officially available now. “It's so intense. I'm a huge glasses connoisseur. It's my number one accessory.”

The content creator and Anything Goes podcast host’s love of glasses — and Warby Parker specifically — goes way back, so it only made sense to partner with the popular brand for a collection of her own. As Chamberlain grows her fashion empire, she’s been working to branch out in design and curation, and this allowed her to add another project to her résumé that combined a lot of her favorite things (including pigeons, but more on that later).

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“The most challenging part of this was making final decisions,” Chamberlain says of her collection of six limited-edition frames. “I definitely experienced major decision fatigue, where I had so many choices, it became hard to make a decision. One thing was easy, though, and that was the nostalgia factor.”

Chamberlain, 22, recalls walking into a Warby Parker store in San Francisco at age 14 with her dad to get a pair of readers.

“We were drawn in naturally, and that just so rarely happens, at least to me anymore as an avid online shopper,” she says. “So it was a very organic discovery.”

The layout of the store and the vast selection kept her happy the whole time she was shopping, and it sparked joy in her that made her fall in love with the brand — and glasses as a whole.

“You can see everything and they're so welcoming about getting your hands dirty and getting in there and trying on whatever your heart imagines,” she says of the stores. “And as a 14-year-old at the time, it was very rare that I got to go into a store and touch whatever I wanted.”

That day, Chamberlain bought a pair of Durand frames — and in the collection she designed, she has her own take on the Durand because it “obviously had to be included,” she says.

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The rest of her collection — which starts at $95 per pair —  includes what she calls a “diverse and balanced” group of frames that will appeal to a wide variety of customers, because she wants as many people as possible to be able to wear her glasses. Though she admits that she’s the first person to reach for out-of-the-box fashion pieces and avant-garde silhouettes, she knows that’s not what the everyday consumer will do. Thus, she picked colors that are neutral (with a twist!) and shapes that flatter.

“I like colors that are neutral while still fun, with the one exception being red, because I think that every outfit can use a pop of red,” she says of the colorways you’ll find in her collab. “The colors are subdued, but they're still exciting. You can't wear a crazy bright blue pair of frames every day. It's not always going to work. It might work for some people, but it's harder to style. I wanted to choose colors that I felt were easier to style on a consistent basis.”

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For frame shapes, in addition to the “classic” Durand, she also has the wire-frame Braswell, which she calls “timeless,” and the “statement” Lonnie frame — which she admits are “not that bold” for her but will be for some people.

“That one is a totally approachable shape that can spice up an outfit if you want it to,” she says. “I tried to hit as many aesthetics as I could. Not every pair of glasses out there looks good on everyone. We all have different face shapes, we all have different noses, we all have different ears, we all have a different forehead. Everybody's so different and glasses look different on everyone.”

For the campaign, shot by Emily Lipson and styled by Chamberlain’s stylist Jared Ellner, the Chamberlain Coffee creator wears each of her frames and shares the spotlight with a selection of pigeons — her favorite animal.

“It’s almost like they chose me,” she says of how the humble pigeon became her favorite animal years ago. “I spent so much time in cities with lots of pigeons: New York, Paris. And I think it might've been a subconscious thing. It was like, how therapeutic it could be to love something that's hated but abundant. Now every time I see a pigeon, guess who gets a smile on their face? Me. Everyone else is like, ‘Ew, a pigeon.’ Not me. I'm like, ‘Wow, what a gorgeous little animal and what a little buddy this is for me.’ ”

When the shoot was coming together, there was quite literally “no other option” for her costar, she shares. “It was the perfect mascot.”

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As Chamberlain’s creations roll out into the world — in select Warby Parker stores and online — she’s feeling a little anxious and a little bit like she’s giving birth, but mostly she’s feeling relief. She’s excited to see it all come together, she’s excited to be a part of Warby Parker’s Buy a Pair, Give a Pair program, and she’s looking ahead to her next collection with the brand — because she promises this is definitely not the end.

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“I’m always dealing with perfectionism in a way,” she admits. “I think that’s normal when you design something to feel a little regret or feel like you would have done something differently. Every time I've ever designed something, I'm always like, ‘I should have done this, I should have done that,’ But that's why it's exciting that Warby and I are not done. We're not done together.”

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