Tag: Envision

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Vanessa Vigar: Redefining Access with Envision Glasses

The Beyond Sight Magazine header photo (a still from her video) features Vanessa Vigar, a white female in her fifties, with medium-length auburn/reddish hair, seated at a desk against a modern, minimalist backdrop with angular shapes and subtle color contrasts. She wears a light-colored top with a checkered jacket, which has a soft texture. The background has muted tones, enhancing the overall sophistication. The text on the cover includes the magazine's tagline, 'A Bold Blind Beauty Project,' and identifies the issue as April 2025.

 ”I have had a lot of experience in working with technologies of different kinds and media, which is very visual. So it was quite funny to come to a company where we were working with creating amazing products, which are all about the audio experience, primarily for a non-visual audience.”

~Vanessa Vigar

Editor’s Note

This month, Bold Blind Beauty’s Cane EnAbled shines a spotlight on Vanessa Vigar, the dynamic Chief Marketing Officer at Envision. Vanessa brings a powerful and unique perspective to her role, blending over 25 years of global marketing expertise with her personal journey of navigating sight loss due to Retinitis Pigmentosa. This lived experience fuels her passion at Envision, a company at the forefront of developing assistive technology that truly empowers the blind and low-vision community to achieve independent access to information.

Since joining Envision in 2021, Vanessa has been instrumental in shaping their brand, communications, and growth strategy, driving the impact of innovative tools like the Envision Glasses and the accessible AI assistant, Ally. As you’ll hear in her engaging conversation, Vanessa’s leadership is deeply informed by her own experiences with assistive technology and her profound understanding of the community’s needs. Based in Leiden, the Netherlands, and also a runner with the Dutch Running Blind team, Vanessa infuses her work with empathy, energy, and a clear vision for the future of inclusive design. We are thrilled to share her compelling story and the exciting advancements happening at Envision with our audience.

Watch Vanessa’s video or, for those who prefer reading, find the transcript below. Enjoy!

Stephanae McCoy
Editor-in-Chief, Bold Blind Beauty

Beyond Sight Magazine Cover

A still from her video, features Vanessa Vigar, a white female in her fifties, with medium-length auburn/reddish hair, seated at a desk against a modern, minimalist backdrop with angular shapes and subtle color contrasts. She wears a light-colored top with a checkered jacket, which has a soft texture. The background has muted tones, enhancing the overall sophistication. The text on the cover includes the magazine's tagline, 'A Bold Blind Beauty Project,' and identifies the issue as April 2025.
Vanessa Vigar | Envision | Cane EnAbled April 2025

YouTube Video

Vanessa Vigar | Envision | April Cane EnAbled

Introduction and Background

Hi. It’s great to be here. Thank you, Bold Blind Beauty, for inviting me to be here. My name is Vanessa Vigar. I’m the Chief Marketing Officer at Envision. We’re a software company that makes smart glasses, apps, and other services for people who are blind and have low vision. 

I am, how do I put this? Politely in my fifties, white female, medium length auburn sort of reddish hair, I guess. And today I am wearing one of my favorite vintage jackets with a white t-shirt. 

My journey so far with sight loss. I’ve been working in media technologies for a very long time. And in the early two thousands, I was diagnosed with retinitis pigmentosa, and that was around the time I switched to working from the content side of media to the more technical side. And it was really interesting because I could see there was a great opportunity there for accessibility, although I didn’t understand how that could be applied.

Joining Envision and Its Impact

So joining Envision felt, really, really natural. I mean, I think I have had a lot of experience in working with technologies of different kinds and media, which is very visual. So it was quite funny to come to a company where we were working on creating amazing products, which are all about the audio experience, primarily for a non-visual audience. So I just really felt at home, I felt that I could ask those questions about sight loss, and for myself, also learning about the community. So it was very immersive, straight away.

But I love what’s happening. 

So the very fact that AI has made this quantum shift for information and wearables as well, and envision has established itself as the sort of expert in the accessibility space between those two factors. So, you know, the AI side, and the wearable side, and to be working with a company that was pioneering this for accessibility is just hugely fulfilling. 

Personal Experiences with Assistive Technology

So what is interesting is that through my work, I get to talk to hundreds of people, and learn the stories of hundreds of people with vision loss. And everybody has their own way of dealing with it. I have colleagues who are fully blind and customers as well. And, of course, that journey is also different. Everybody has what we call a toolkit of stuff, right? From white canes to dogs to, you know, technology. 

And so I am at that point where I am still using more of the accessibility features in my devices than specialist assistive technology products like screen readers, for instance. I can still get by, as I said, through muddle, through enlarging text. But I notice I’m doing much more voiceover and dictation, I’m doing much more with voice notes. I’m doing much more audible kinds of transmitted content, but I am using Ally. This is our AI assistant accessible AI assistant. I use Ella and Ally for so many things, and I do use the Envision glasses as well. I use the scan, text reading feature a lot because you know, it’s very tiring to read print, text, especially when I live in the Netherlands. My Dutch is okay, but reading and writing it is terrible. So I love to read the newspapers or I like to understand my tax bills.

Demonstrating Envision Glasses

a vibrant indoor stage scene featuring three people, two women and one man. The background is a striking purple with a graphic pattern, and bold white text reads “FOR GLASSES PEOPLE WHO SEE FOR LOW.” The woman on the left is wearing a patterned dress, while Vanessa, in the center, is holding a white cane, dressed in a moto jacket and metallic-looking pants. The man to her left is casually dressed in a polo shirt, pants, and sneakers.
Tech Catwalk 2025

You know, since I’m talking about the Envision glasses, let’s take a look at them in action, shall we? So, they are, in a protective case, very good. When I lose the case and sit on it and do things on it, it’s a very attractive-looking pair of glasses. I won’t go into the whole demo now because that’s all available on our website. 

But the smart bit is on the right-hand side. And I’m just going to swap these out. I’ve got my lens frames here, prescription as well, ’cause I’m also shortsighted. As if RP and anything else aren’t enough. So, we have a series of features on the glasses. I can use voice controls, or I can use gestures to navigate to them. 

Vanessa: And I’m just gonna go straight to Ally now. So let’s just see where I am. 

Ally: Hey. 

Vanessa: Hi Ally. Can you tell me a little bit about what’s going on in the news today in the US?

Ally: On March 26th, 2025, several significant events have been reported in the United States, one Trump’s executive order on the election. President Donald Trump signed an executive order aimed at making sweeping changes to the US election system. The order requires the Election Assistance Commission to revamp the voter. 

Vanessa: Okay. Right. Let’s just stop that, Ella. I don’t want to know more about that. But what I will do now is I’m gonna ask Ella to tell me about this recipe.

Ally: Got no problem. If there’s anything else you’re curious about or need help with, just let me know. 

Vanessa: Okay, Ella? I do, I do. I’ve got a brownie recipe, which I think is in French. Could you just take a look at it? Also, just gimme a recommendation for options for vegans, please.

Ally: Let me take a look. To make this brownie recipe vegan, you can make the following substitutions. One, butter. Use a plant-based margarine or coconut oil. Two eggs. Replace each egg with a flaxseed egg mix: one tablespoon of ground flaxseed with three tablespoons of water, and let it sit until it thickens. Three. Ensure the chocolate is vegan. Use vegan chocolate that doesn’t contain milk or any. 

Vanessa: Ella, that is fantastic. That’s great. Hey, listen, I’m gonna be heading back home to Leiden in the Netherlands this afternoon. Could you tell me if I need to bring my umbrella with me? 

Ally: You won’t need an umbrella in Leiden today. The sky will be clear with the temperature of about 50 degrees Fahrenheit. Safe travels. 

Future of Ally and Envision

So that was a quick example of Ally on the Envision Glasses, which is also now Ally on the mobile. So we have iOS and Android that went live only fairly recently. But it’s free, download it, have a play with it. It’s also on PC, so if you’re on your Mac, on your desktop, it doesn’t have to be on Mac; it can be anything, you can use Ally there to help you. 

So the idea is that Ally will be everywhere. That I can start using it, for instance, on my mobile phone in the morning, checking the weather, or just checking my calendar. Calendar integration is, is, is any minute, and that is fantastic. So I can literally say, what’s on my agenda today? What’s the weather like? What time do I need to get, you know, at the house to get to X, Y, Z? Putting all those pieces together, it just makes it so useful. 

And then when I’m on the train, for instance, I could either use Ally on my phone, but I can also go into my glasses and say help me find an empty seat. And do all those things hand-free that I might need, because I’m using my cane for instance.

You know, there’s a lot of information there on the personalities. You heard my Ally, I call her Ella, she’s kind of got a dry British sense of humor. But we’ve got a ton of characters there and voices, and it’s fun, and it’s customized. So I put in information about me. So the information she gives me is contextual to me, and that personalization is, is groundbreaking, it is. So yes, as you can tell, I’m not shy about talking about our products because I can relate to it. I use Envision and certainly the Ally and glasses almost every day. 

Conclusion and Contact Information

So yeah, finding more information about Envision. Well, what we try to be everywhere, not just our products, but in terms of our marketing channels as well. We’re on all the social media accounts or channels, or whatever, but let’s envision we’re also online. Of course, we have a website, which is called letsenvision.com. That’s L-E-T-S-E-N-V-I-S-I-O-N.com. And Ally, you can find out about our glasses and our products there, but you can also go directly to the Ally site, which is Ally.me, which is A-L-L-Y.M-E.

Vanessa Vigar – Chief Marketing Officer, Envision

Vanessa Vigar is the Chief Marketing Officer at Envision, where she brings over 25 years of global marketing and communications experience to support the company’s mission: creating assistive technology that empowers people who are blind or have low vision to access information for themselves. Since joining Envision in 2021, she has led the company’s brand, communications, and growth strategy—helping expand the reach of its award-winning Envision Glasses, Envision app, and accessible AI assistant, Ally.

Diagnosed in her mid-30s with Retinitis Pigmentosa, Vanessa combines her personal experience of vision loss with a professional passion for storytelling, inclusion, and meaningful innovation. She is committed to helping good people and clever technologies find their voice and achieve their purpose. Before Envision, she held leadership roles across industries, building purpose-driven brands and teams through periods of change and transformation.
Living in Leiden, the Netherlands, Vanessa is an avid runner with the Dutch Running Blind team. Her perspective as a low-vision professional brings authenticity, empathy, and energy to her work, making her a compelling voice in conversations around accessibility, inclusive design, and the future of assistive technology.

Learn More About Envision

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Image Descriptions

  • The Beyond Sight Magazine header photo (a still from her video) features Vanessa Vigar, a white female in her fifties, with medium-length auburn/reddish hair, seated at a desk against a modern, minimalist backdrop with angular shapes and subtle color contrasts. She wears a light-colored top with a checkered jacket, which has a soft texture. The background has muted tones, enhancing the overall sophistication. The text on the cover includes the magazine’s tagline, ‘A Bold Blind Beauty Project,’ and identifies the issue as April 2025.
  • YouTube Video: Described in the Beyond Sight Magazine image above.
  • Tech Catwalk 2025: a vibrant indoor stage scene featuring three people, two women and one man. The background is a striking purple with a graphic pattern, and bold white text that’s cut off reads “GLASSES WHO LOW.” The woman on the left is wearing a patterned dress, while Vanessa, in the center, is holding a white cane, dressed in a moto jacket and metallic-looking pants. The man to her left is casually dressed in a polo shirt, pants, and sneakers.