just to calm everyone's nerves ...
i work in the fashion industry and a do have a little intel on this ... first of all, not one fashion house does their sunglasses in house. 100% of those are licensed through major companies like Safilo, luxottica, De Rigo, etc.
Celine's sunglasses used to be licensed through De Rigo - an italian optical licensing company that also does sunglasses for bulgari / bluemarine / chopard, etc. In November 2011, Celine left De Rigo due to their subpar production, and signed onto Safilo Group, an LVMH owned licensing company that does eyewear for Balenciaga, Marc Jacobs, Bottega,
Gucci, etc. All of Celine's eyewear landing in stores starting January 2012 would be coming from Safillo and not De Rigo.
you will definitely see a difference in quality - BETTER quality. De Rigo is notorious in producing subpar quality, and i did see this in Celine sunglasses in 2011 - the arms had always been wonky and uneven (when you rest the sunglasses on the table, you'd see one arm raised in mid air), the acrylic frames were always minorly scratched up here and there even when freshly unwrapped from plastic wrapping. sometimes, one of the arms would open up wider than the other arm. the worst is that each pair fitted differently.
due to switching to a new licensing company, there are definitely going to be minor color / production changes - such as a diff. tort pattern, diff. lens color, different metal pin inside the arms, etc. this does not mean that the sunglasses are not authentic, but rather they have switched to a different manufacturer that may provide slightly different options for Celine to select from.
these things happen all the time with fashion companies and with myself working in a similar fashion environment, professionally speaking, they do understand the chances that meticulous customers like you all will notice minor differences, but does hope that in the long run the quality can surpass the worry that this can initially raise.
