Can Kylie Jenner Really Make AI Glasses Cool?

The outside of Terminal Warehouse, the office space on the west side of Manhattan, looked like a scene out of New York Fashion Week last night. Meta had called upon the fashion set to gather for the reveal of its latest line of Meta Glasses, the AI lenses the Facebook and Instagram parent company debuted with Ray-Ban in 2021. They’ve come a long way since: This lineup, still developed with EssilorLuxottica, the owner of Ray-Ban, offers a wider range of styles and even a pair codesigned by Kylie Jenner.

Since the first launch, Meta has been hard at work in making AI glasses a thing. There was the first generation, Ray-Ban Stories, launched in 2021. Then a second launch in 2023, the Ray-Ban Meta, with a better camera resolution. Last year, at Meta Connect in Menlo Park, California, Mark Zuckerberg announced the next generation of Ray-Ban Meta glasses, plus an Oakley Meta pair made for running, which he wear-tested himself with Diplo, and the all-new Meta Ray-Ban Display, its first AI glasses with an integrated display and neural wristband. Sure, they were very cool in terms of tech, but when I tried them on, they did not feel like anything I could see myself needing. Plus the idea of wearing AI glasses and a tech-bro wrist accessory was, truthfully, a nonstarter.

That launch, it seems, came and went. I’ve seen the Oakleys around the city, but I’ve only encountered one or two other strangers wearing Meta Glasses out in the world. AI glasses, generally, are a tricky proposition. For starters, the internet sees these wearables, which include cameras on its frames for photo and video capture, as “surveillance capitalism.” Meaning, they are invasive and make it altogether too simple for people to take photos and videos of unassuming subjects. Also, unlike a fitness tracker like an Oura Ring, or even an Apple Watch, they’re harder to justify as a necessity. They are, it seems, still one step too far when it comes to our collective comfort level with technology.

In May, Google announced its upcoming AI-powered glasses, being developed with Samsung and Warby Parker and Gentle Monster. And just last week, Snap Inc.’s Evan Spiegel announced the launch of Specs, the AR glasses that are the reimagined version of the not-so-popular Spectacles from 2016. They retail for just over $2,000, in contrast to Meta’s $300-to-$400-ish range. They do more, of course; the augmented reality aspect of them gets closer to the functionality of a smart phone, but the look of them is…clunkier.

Spiegel seems to be building up to a splashy launch—with a campaign photographed by Steven Meisel featuring Jack Harlow, Hoyeon, Kaia Gerber, and Jimmy Butler.

And yet it seems like Zuckerberg has once again won this round by throwing Jenner into the mix. It also helps that Zuck has one of the most well-regarded fashion person in his corner: Eva Chen, Meta’s vice president of fashion, who is very good at her job and can easily fill a room with industry leaders: She had Vogue’s Chloe Malle, Puck’s Rickie De Sole, celebrity stylist Law Roach, Harper’s Bazaar’s Samira Nasr, and more bold names in the room taking turns meeting Zuckerberg. I myself had a brief conversation with him, in which he told me about his love for our cover star, Lisa. Oh, and Timothée Chalamet made an appearance too.