Crossing the Atlantic by sail, while being visually impaired, is the challenge that Marseille sailor Joël Paris is renewing at the end of June. He will be at the start of the Transat Québec Saint-Malo. And to do this, he will benefit from tailor-made glasses manufactured in the Meuse, in the special lenses unit of the Essilor factory.
The site is unique in the world, here in Ligny-en-Barrois in the Meuse. We design custom eyeglass lenses there. This is the specialty of this workshop, a concentrate of craftsmanship and technology that helps the visually impaired.
A disabled person is someone who does things differently. He gets there, but differently.
Joël Paris, amateur sailor
With 2/10 in the left eye and 0 in the right eye, 60-year-old sailor Joël Paris is preparing. “I am 60 years old. I was born with a congenital cataract. I have worn glasses since I was a kid. They have been made since my birth here in the Meuse. By coming here, I discovered how glasses are made. And knowing that more than forty people work on my glasses… It’s crazy!” says the navigator. In a few days, on June 30, he will start the Transat Quebec Saint-Malo. A race non-stop and crewed.
Because despite his handicap and his visual impairment, Joël Paris managed to become a navigator. Last year, in 2023, it has participated in the Transat Jacques Vabre. “A disabled person is someone who does things differently. He gets there, but differently. We get there and we sail at a high level to bear witness, it’s a message of strength”, explains Joël Paris.
This year, Joël Paris will benefit from these special sunglasses tailor-made for his eyes.
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Visit to the Essilor special glass manufacturing site in the Meuse.
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©France Télévisions
More than 80,000 special spectacle lenses leave the workshops each year. Custom-made lenses that correct extreme myopia or overdeveloped hyperopia.
Suffering from a congenital cataract and glaucoma, Joël Paris is visually impaired. Here in the Essilor factory in the Meuse.
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© France televisions
Leonel Pereira is the head of Essilor’s special glass manufacturing activity. “Mr. Paris has strong ametropia, hyperopia, and the particularity that he has is that he underwent an ablation of the lens due to the treatment of his cataract. It is an optically imperfect eye. So this led to the development of a particular design for us, which is specific to him, a particular design in a gendarme hat, which corresponds to him.”specifies Leonel Pereira.
The association of Joël Paris “Dream as far as the eye can see” highlights disability as a performance factor.
