From wave to mount

OCENEO was born from an observation made on an Australian East Coast beach in 2018: a torn wetsuit, and no one to recycle it. Each year, tens of tons of neoprene end up in landfills or incinerators, even though the material still has so much to offer.

From this waste came a simple conviction, which became our raison d'être: never throw away what can be reborn. Rather than constantly producing more, we start with what already exists, a wetsuit that has surfed, dived, and lived, to give it a noble and desirable second life.

Every pair of OCENEO glasses carries this story. Handcrafted near the Bassin d'Arcachon, it proves that technical waste can become a stylish, durable, and locally manufactured object. This is the whole meaning of our approach.

Traditional recycling grinds, melts, and degrades material until it loses value. Upcycling does the opposite: it transforms waste into a higher-value product, without losing any of its quality.

Specifically, we recover end-of-life surf, dive, and kite wetsuits. They are sorted, cut, then ground into a fine neoprene powder. Mixed with a biosourced resin, this powder becomes a solid and flexible sheet, the raw material for our frames.

The result: a unique material, with shades never quite identical from one pair to the next. No new wetsuits are produced to make our glasses. Each frame is, literally, an old wetsuit continuing its story.

Circularity isn't a marketing gimmick: it's how our entire model is conceived, from collection to final assembly. Wetsuits are collected, processed, and shaped in a short supply chain, a few kilometers from the workshop.

Nothing is wasted. Production scraps don't go into the trash: they feed NEOPOP, our division dedicated to objects, POS displays, and furniture made from recycled neoprene. The material thus extends far beyond glasses and constantly finds new uses.

We also work hand-in-hand with ESATs (establishments and services for assistance through work) and local partners. Behind each pair, there's a second life for the material, but also a second chance for those who shape it.