Google Glass Release Date, Specs, Price, Review Update: AR Lens Gets A Makeover, Glass Team Aims To Give Gadget A Chic Look

Google Glass release date will be early 2014, according to numerous speculations, with a price tag of around $299. But the release date and consumer pricing aside, the Glass Team seems to be upping the ante of the gadget’s chic look.

The gigantic Vogue September issue has featured a story with models wearing Google Glass as an accessory and designer Diane von Fustenberg’s show last year showed off the Explorer edition of the accessory. The most recent look of Glass (seen in the image above), is the first that was designed by the Google team that doesn’t look too futuristic.

CNET reported that the new design was posted on Isabelle Olsson’s Google+ page a few weeks ago. Olsson is the lead industrial designer on the Glass team who the New York Times described as “one of a group of women charged by the company with turning Glass into the next It accessory.”

The lead designer’s take on the Augmented Reality lens is certainly more stylish than the Explorer model, CNET noted. It is surprisingly effective at hiding the normally garish protrusion of the Glass hardware, CNET observed.

Earlier in the year, there were rumors that Google might want to bring hip eyeglass startup Warby Parker into the team to further make the lens look hip. It may still be a possibility but it seems that the tech giant has its own team already at the helm of making a the Glass, in CNET’s description, “a little less Android and a lot more human.”