Barbara Crolla

‘It’s a Neighborhood’: Local Optometrist Marks 35-Year Milestone at New Canaan Eye Associates

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Dr. Rick Crolla’s foray into optometry began unexpectedly during a summer trip in the late-1970s to his in-laws’ cottage in Charleston, R.I.

He and his new bride—1971 New Canaan High School graduate Barbara Sawicky—were living in Boston at the time. They’d both earned bachelor’s degrees from Central Connecticut State University—she in early childhood and special education, he a secondary education degree in biology and chemistry. 

“The plan was we were both going to teach,” Crolla recalled on a recent morning. “But there were no jobs available when we graduated.”

So Crolla, thinking he’d need additional income to supplement his future pay as a teacher, spent three years earning a second bachelor’s degree, in pharmacy. Yet working as a pharmacist didn’t satisfy Crolla, who during one stint in Quincy, Mass. was held up by a man who pulled a sawed-off shotgun out of a Lord & Taylor bag. 

His father-in-law—Dr. Edward Sawicky, who had launched New Canaan Eye Associates on Elm Street in 1948—turned to him over cocktails at the cottage and asked whether he’d consider going back to school for optometry.

Barbara Crolla

‘I Love Being Able To Help People Feel Better’: Parents Inspire New Canaan Woman To Launch Skin Care Business

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Growing up in her family’s Main Street home, Calie Crolla often heard the phone ring at the crack of dawn or a pager go off right before bed. Both parents owned and operated their own businesses—her mom, Barbara, the Day Care Center of New Canaan and her dad, Rick, an optometrist at New Canaan Eye Associates on East Avenue since 1984. Another child may have been envious of the attention those jobs demanded. Yet for Crolla, it provided firsthand knowledge of the responsibility that small business ownership entails, instilling a work ethic that would lead the New Canaan resident to launch her own enterprise. On July 25, 2018, she opened Skin Care by Calie in Norwalk.