Serious Bling: Hearing Aid Accessories

Mimi Shulman

Acclaimed designer and artist Mimi Shulman remembers the incident that changed the way she thought about her hearing loss.
She and a friend had stopped at a Toronto restaurant where they encountered a rowdy bunch who wouldn't keep the noise down despite several complaints from them. The pair left the restaurant because Mimi couldn't hear through the noise.
She later called the restaurant and instead of getting an apology the owner became abusive.
"He said that noise is what restaurants are all about and if I didn't like it, I shouldn't go to restaurants," she remembers.
Mimi became so insensed that she filed a unsuccessful human rights complaint.
It was at that point she decided she was tired of being judged and mistreated.
"I wanted to let people know that I'm not stigmatized or ashamed of my hearing loss, and wanted to make a highly visible statement that was also fun."
The artist who is famous for making jewelry for such celebrities as Martin Scorsese, Susan Sarandon and Mickey Rourke began to make hearing aid accessories.
"The first prototype I made was a banana and I also made a t-shirt that said "I can't hear you; I have a banana in my ear."
Feast your eyes on some of Mimi's wild creations.

Kate Cross

Kate Cross, an British audiologist, who has been partially deaf since birth and worn hearing aids since she was 10, has designed a line of accessories she called Hearrings. The business was a fluke, the result of a challenge from the British Society of Hearing Aid Audiologists to challenge people's common perceptions of hearing aids.

"I wore a variety of designs for the conference and I had so much positive response from them that I thought there might be a market," she says. "But I also wanted to challenge the perception of hearing aids as 'beige bananas' and get people talking about hearing aids."
As a result of her experimentation, she received extensive media coverage not just in the health pages but in the fashion pages as well.
"It has allowed me to discuss how hearing aids have changed and all the funky features such as Bluetooth integration with iPhones and iPods and mobile phones. This seems to interest people."


Other Designs for Hearing Aid Accessories