A coating and associated method for coating is disclosed. The coating provides a hard, transparent, UV blocking coating for a substrate. A UV blocking layer is first deposited upon the substrate, and a hard coating is deposited above the UV blocking layer. A soft coating layer may be deposited between the UV blocking layer and the hard coating. The soft and hard coating layers may both have the general composition SiOxCy. the soft and hard coating layers may be deposited by a plasma vapor deposition process.