I never planned a career designing eyewear. In fact, when I flew to Hong Kong in 1996 with £200 in my pocket, I’d no idea at all what I wanted to do. I’d just finished an art and design degree and was seeking an adventure before real life began. What I stumbled into was an adventure that somehow became real life.

A clockmaker looking to branch out into eyewear took me on as his designer. I knew absolutely nothing about glasses, so I improvised. I bought Vogue, drew frames over the models’ faces, then asked people in the bar where I worked what they liked about their glasses – or hated. That’s how I began to learn the craft.

Four years later I came home and set up my own brand, Tom Davies Bespoke Eyewear. I was young, broke, naive and fuelled by the slightly mad conviction that I could build the world’s best bespoke glasses company. Now, more than two decades on, we’ve got a factory and stores in London, a team of incredible craftspeople and even hospital-grade dry eye clinics. But I still get the same thrill from making a single pair of frames as I did when I began.

My frames range from the affordable all the way up to an 18-carat gold pair that would set you back £10,000: what I like to call the “King Midas” version. As a society, we spend a fortune on handbags, watches or shoes, but glasses are the first item people see when they meet us.

So why not wear something that looks and feels fabulous? A client once asked why she should buy one of my most expensive frames. I said: “Happy Christmas to me?” She bought them on the spot. I even have a gold business card. When I gave one to Stephen Fry, he looked at it, sighed and said, “Damn it. I’ve just given up cocaine. It would have been very useful.”

My factory is like an adult playground. We’ve held Sega Rally competitions on the mezzanine and barbecues on the rooftop. I make glasses from pretty much any material. One day I bought a fragment that hit Mars 3,000 years ago, ground it into powder and turned it into sunglasses. We auctioned them for £3,000 for the fantastic eye charity Orbis. That’s the thing about design: it’s not really about product, it’s about curiosity. What happens if I mix art, science and silliness together? Usually something wonderful.

My first (at that point unofficial) celebrity client was Richard Branson. I’d been chatting nervously to a Virgin check-in assistant about her badly fitting glasses and offered to make her a new pair. I wasn’t fishing for an upgrade, though I did get promoted to Upper Class. To thank Richard, I thought I’d design him some frames. Since I didn’t know him, I needed his measurements, so I climbed under the rope at Madame Tussauds and measured his waxwork.

Then came the call from a costume designer looking for glasses for Rowan Atkinson in the film Keeping Mum. I made him a pair and suddenly Hollywood started knocking. I’m proud to say Angelina Jolie in The Tourist, Henry Cavill in Superman v Batman, Brad Pitt in Allied, Tom Holland in Spider-Man are all wearing my creations. One day, driving up the M1, I got a call: “I’m on set with Angelina. She doesn’t like the Ferragamo glasses. She wants yours. We need them in Venice in four days.” I nearly spun the car around there and then.

There have been so many surreal moments. During Cruella, costume legend Jenny Beavan told me that Emma Thompson’s assistant was described in the script as “the best-looking man in London” and needed the perfect glasses. “When’s it filming?” I asked. “This afternoon.” So I took of my own pair and gave them to him. Later I saw the stills and thought: “Damn. He looks better than me... in my glasses.”

One of my favourite and most loyal customers was the late Carrie Fisher. My store manager called one day: “Tom, Carrie Fisher is in the shop.” My manager knew I was a massive Star Wars fan. And I knew I had to drop everything and get to the store. Within five minutes of meeting Carrie, she declared me “Mr Fisher” – apparently an honour reserved for very few. We became close friends.

Though not as close as perhaps she wanted. She once led me to her bedroom and I said: “Carrie, I’m a married man.” She shot back: “What the fuck’s that got to do with it?” She became one of my most loyal clients: she bought 30 pairs a year, always insisted on paying, and even took me to the Star Wars: The Force Awakens premiere.

Heston Blumenthal is another long-term client and friend. I once swapped him a pair of sunglasses for one of his prototype microwaves after we’d both had rather a heavy night. I remember flagging down a taxi with a high-tech microwave under my arm.

Ed Sheeran, on the other hand, found me on Google. When I went to fit his first horn-rimmed frames, my assistant forgot my tools. So Ed’s wife kindly leant me her hair straighteners, a hairdryer and some socks to adjust them. For another pair, I asked for cooking oil and a pair of Marigolds and ended up heating the frames in a saucepan. Before I left, Ed asked me to sign the wall in his studio. I spotted Damien Hirst’s shark sketch next to his name, so I couldn’t resist drawing a pair of glasses next to mine.

Despite the high-profile encounters, there are plenty of moments that aren’t glamorous. Designing can be hard graft – hours spent tweaking a hinge, reshaping a bridge, fixing a tiny flaw that no one else might notice.

Running a factory means juggling creative chaos with relentless detail: production schedules, staff training, suppliers, machines that go wrong at the worst possible time. There are days when the pressure gets too much.

But then someone puts on a pair of glasses we’ve made. They look in the mirror and suddenly their posture changes, their confidence lifts – and I remember why I started.

A great pair of glasses isn’t just about seeing better, it’s about being seen differently. It’s art that lives on your face. When I first began, I used to wear my own frames, even though I had 20:20 vision. My vision’s changed so I now need them – and I’m hardly going to wear anyone else’s designs.

Over the years I’ve been called a “mad professor” and the “Willy Wonka of eyewear”, both of which I take as a huge compliment. I’ve had my share of lucky breaks and crazy moments, but I think the real secret of my success is caring about every pair as if it’s the first. Whatever I’m doing and whoever it’s for, I still feel like the same guy who once drew glasses on the cover of Vogue and hoped that someone, one day, might wear them.