WAIMEA — Betty Webster’s sunglasses collection is like its curator: colorful, cheery, and a little bit funky.
There are shades in all shades of the rainbow, New Year’s Eve sunglasses for every year since 1999, and sunglasses sporting stripes, polka dots, and sparkles.
There’s even a hand-decorated pair made by Webster’s great-granddaughter for her August wedding last year. A little veil attaches to the sunglasses.
People who’ve seen Webster sporting a different pair every day (more often, it’s multiple pairs per day) may have wondered how many glasses, exactly, she has.
Answer: 1,506 and counting. But it’s the former number that earned Webster a Guinness World Record for the world’s largest sunglasses collection.
The Waimea Arts Council is holding a community-wide potluck from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. tonight at the Hawaiian Homelands Hall to celebrate the record-setting occasion. Organizers are asking guests to bring a potluck dish to the event as well as eating dishes and utensils. KTA Super Stores will be providing dessert.
Guests should also bring a pair of — you guessed it — sunglasses.
In addition to the official Guinness World Record certificate, Webster will receive a Hawaii County commendation.
The event also is a celebration of the people — well over 600 — who helped prepare an especially creative Guinness application.
“We had to take pictures of all the glasses, and write a little history of each (pair of) glasses,” Webster said.
But it wasn’t simply photos of glasses the Guinness committee received. They got to see the sunglasses in action.
Last March, the arts council put out a call for residents to come have their portraits taken while wearing a pair of sunnies.
Organizer and arts council president Paul Bryant said 638 “physical bodies” — a handful of dogs participated, as did one stoic cat statue — turned out to serve as models.
Only about 60 people showed up the first day.
“We had no clue what we were going to get,” Bryant said. “We were hoping for 150 at least.” But turnout increased over the next week. To help the process, some people donned multiple pairs. Family members were recruited.
“I forgot how cute some of the kids were,” Bryant said. It took 10 days to complete the project.
All of the photos will be on display at tonight’s event, in the form of three giant posters created by photographer Barbara Schaefer.
Webster wasn’t even sure initially how many pairs she had until the documentation began, just that it was around 1,300: more than enough for a new record.
And Webster intends to hold on to her title, so her family will be able to look it up well into the future.
“My next goal is to get to 3,000,” she said.
It’s shaping up to be a busy end of the month for Webster — she turned 87 on Monday.
Unsurprisingly, she has the perfect pair of sunglasses to describe this week’s events.
They spell out the word “COOL.”
