Credit: Brian Travers
Dr. Brian Travers’ clear masks offer protection while leaving smiles visible.
An unfortunate aspect of the mask requirements most public businesses now have is that those who are hard of hearing cannot mitigate their disability by reading lips. With everyone’s faces covered by masks, it becomes that much more difficult for deaf folks who already have a hard time conversing with others. This is why one former physician taught himself to sew.
Dr. Brian Travers lost his hearing in 2002 due to osteogenesis imperfecta, a bone condition that damaged the small bones in his ears. While he has since learned to read lips to make life easier for himself, the difficulty the current situation has presented him with made him feel more reluctant to leave the house and interact with others. If he requested someone to lower their mask so he could read their lips, they would usually refuse, which Travers understood, but that would leave him unable to communicate.
After coming to the realization that other members of the deaf community were likely experiencing the same problem, Travers put the sewing skills he developed in March to make masks toward a new task. By adding a clear plastic panel to the center of his masks, Travers was able to create a mask that still offered the same level of protection while also giving a window to the wearer’s mouth. He started a small company to sell the masks, Anchor Made Design, and after he sent a mask to a Publix employee who wanted to help deaf customers, his business exploded. Even though Travers can sew about eight to ten masks in an hour, demand for these things is so high, there’s currently a 3-4 week wait time.
Travers has said he didn’t make the mask for recognition, but merely because he wanted to ensure that communication has as few barriers between people as possible. “There are no words, there is no dollar value to being able to make a difference,” he told TODAY.
