A transparent optical element (100), includes a plurality of stacked layers (1, 2), each of which consist of cells in which optical phase-shift values are provided. The layers are arranged such that boundaries between certain contiguous cells of one of the layers cut into cells of another layer. In this way, a useful apparent cell size can be reduced so as to reproduce a target optical phase-shift distribution with greater precision. Additionally, the maximum amplitude of optical phase shift variations that are produced by the element increases with the number of stacked layers. The chromatism of the diopter function of the element can also be reduced.