"The model which was awarded the judges special award in 2013 was designed to focus on getting an award at SILMO d'Or. From several years before that, I had been strongly aware of not only Asia but also the European and American markets, and it was also the point at which I began to engage in design. The joining of gold and titanium is a skill unique to our company. To learn this, and working out how to get there was how we designed the front frame."
This model was a special edition that used premium materials such as bamboo and gold, and the 60 sets produced worldwide sold out immediately in spite of the high price of 600,000 Japanese yen.
In the following year 2014, they received the gold medal in the sunglasses category for a collaboration with fashion designer, Kenzo Takada, .
"You could say it was a result of this being the first collaboration with Kenzo Takada, and that we were aiming to win. If we produced something mode-ish under our regular collection, we would have deviated from their image, but in this kind of collaboration you can have a sense of "anything goes". This award-winning model is also simple at first sight but is a complicated structure where plastic is wrapped around the armour-like metal parts. Kenzo's standpoint was, "If there is no volume in the sides it doesn't feel high-class" and so on. It was a design that caused all kinds of trouble within our production department (laughs)

Needless to say, it's very hard to even be nominated from eyewear gathered from all over the world at SILMO d'Or, it's a very narrow gate. Nonetheless, won the gold medal in the glasses category in 2015. It was a phenomenal third consecutive award.
"I was happy the third time, because it was a regular collection and because it was a category I wanted to win, I was pretty happy even at the nomination stage simply because I didn't expect to win a third consecutive award. Although it was also a time when popularity had shifted from a cell frame to a combination type, it was still a model that was held in high esteem in Europe. The round beads on the double bar are a truly popular style in Europe, and I have a feeling that that contributed to our win. Our current design team is based abroad, including me in Malaysia, and my brother-in-law is in charge of the American market and so on. Perhaps ideas which are different from those going on in Japan might be a strength."
Unfortunately, their run ended at SILMO d'Or 2016. However, another NIPPON brand, Masahiro Maruyama was nominated. "It was a complex feeling because at the same time I wanted him to win." Here we see the two sides; the creator and the long-established manufacturer of industry drivers. However you look at it, NIPPON design backed by solid technology unfailingly attracts the attention of the eyewear industry worldwide.