Photographer Brandon Stanton has been taking portraits of New Yorkers for his personal project "Humans of New York" since the summer of 2010. Setting out to photograph 10,000 New Yorkers to initially create a census of sorts, the project has now taken a life of its own as he started collecting quotes and stories from his nearly 5,000 subjects. More that just becoming a great source of street style, these portraits give us a poignant glimpses into the lives of the eclectic, intriguing and amazing individuals that reside in New York City. 

“We just got back from the prom.” “Did you have dates?” “Um, yeah.”

“Pounce?” “It’s to remind me to be more aggressive.”

“I like your hat.” “Take my fucking photo.”

Mystical, magical, futuristic, apocalyptic, this is one eclectic list of summer reads. Eclectic has teamed up with Vitalis Chronicles author Jay Swanson to bring you a list of books for the ultimate fantasyscape as you hit the beach this summer.  Swanson is currently living in Paris, but originally hails from the Pacific Northwest, like some of our favourite authors (Frank Herbert, Tom Robbins, Chuck Palahniuk, Ursula K. Le Guin, Sherman Alexie). This week, Swanson releases his third installment in the Vitalis Chronicles the Steps of Krakador, but he took some time out of his busy schedule to talk books with Eclectic.

Fantasy Author Jay Swanson photo by Tom Bradley

Books For a Fantasy Filled Summer With Author Jay Swanson: 

The Mistborn Trilogy - Brian Sanderson. I have to lead with this because it's quickly becoming one of my new loves. Sanderson is one of the most legendary Fantasy writers of our generation, and for good reason. His ability to bring a world to life and draw you into it is spellbinding, but his magic systems take the fascination to a new level. Mistborn takes on the flawed hero in a wonderful way, and if you aren't hooked by the introduction alone then I don't know what I can do for you.

A Wrinkle in Time - Madeleine L'Engle. One of the groundbreaking works in science fiction fantasy that has inspired countless others, A Wrinkle in Time falls into its own timeless part of literary history. Following fourteen year old Meg Murry as she tries to find her father (a scientist gone missing after working on a mysterious project called a tesseract), A Wrinkle in Time broke important boundaries by putting a girl as the central protagonist in a science fiction novel.

The Game is Altered – Mez Packer. If you want to go on a trip this summer this book is for you. Set in the near future that doesn’t look too different from our own, Lionel's changes his life story in a game of CoreQuest where is virtual self becomes an alternate reality. The lines are blurred between his heroic actions and consequential dangers in the real world and the virtual. Upon the book's release last year, The Guardian compared Lionel's avatar narration of his virtual adventures  to that of A Clockwork Orange’s Nadsat.

The Game is Altered from Emily Turvey on Vimeo.

Exploits of Satyr – Todd Crashaw. This book is packed with mental, physical and spiritual seduction. John crash-lands from the sky and discovers he was procreated by a cult as the second coming of Christ. Written with symbolic code, Crawshaw transports us to another Earth with a central nervous system made up of a bio-computer with DNA based intelligence that infiltrates global global communications networks. John must now navigate between the past and present to arrive at the future. Beautifully written, the Exploits of Satyr is building a cult following.

Ender's Game - Orson Scott Card. This is another seminal work in science fiction that will keep you on edge until its mind-blowing finale. Ender is a young prodigy who is sent off-world to train with the military, and whose incredible talent for leadership and tactics propel him to the highest levels of the school as the looming threat of invasion draws near. It's coming out as a movie very soon with Hailee Steinfeld, Jimmy Pinchak,Viola Davis, and Abigail Breslin, so you want to move it to the top of your list immediately.

Magic Kingdom for Sale - SOLD! - Terry Brooks. This series is light and fun and takes a delightful twist on some of our oldest ideas of fantasy. Our protagonist, Ben Holiday, is desperate for a new start to life after the loss of his wife and child, when he sees an ad in the paper selling a magic kingdom. He decides to investigate, and finds himself swept away to a place that connects our world with many others - over which he is suddenly king. It's a daydream many of us share, with love and adventure and lives on the line - why not delve into Brooks' fashioning of it?

The Handmaid’s Tale – Margaret Atwood. More dystopian fiction than fantasy, but we are throwing this pick in to inspire the imagination into a totalitarian near future. When I first read the book IVF and infertitly rarely made the news as did fundamental groups. Now we hear of them daily along with the plight of women from around the world, making The Handmaid’s Tale must read, even if you have read it before, it is becoming more relevant than ever.

The Name of the Wind - Patrick Rothfuss. This is probably one of the greatest debut novels to ever grace the Fantasy shelves. Rothfuss is a master storyteller whose prose is as pleasant as his tale itself. We follow his protagonist, Kvothe, as he tells of how he became a living legend. This story beautifully blends an epic overarching menace with the intimate details of Kvothe's coming of age. I cannot recommend this book enough.

Make sure to read Ender's Game before the movie is released in October 2013

“This is the year that Greece is going to win.” When these words resonated, April 28^th, Petros Efstathiadis closed his eyes.  Being the only Greek in the competition, he realized that he was wining the Jury Grand Prize of Photography of the 28th International Festival of Fashion and Photography in Hyères. Here’s the story.

Through Petros, Greece is winning, and with it a raw, humble and serious type of photography. A type of photography which smells of sulfur and exudes a photojournalistic style. Attentive to his country, concerned with the crisis it is trapped in, Petros devises some playful representations (Liparo) and creates some sculptures (Bombs), with people and objects that come from his small village in northern Greece. The subjects are relatives or neighbors and the objects are from backyards or warehouses. The eye is focused locally and the movement, as we could have guessed, is inductive. By looking closely at what he knows by heart, Petros intends to reflect on his country as well as Europe. This aesthetic and theme show how the festival, staying away from stylized effects, knows how to underline all type of emerging photography as long as they are sought-after.

Cannon, Liparo, 2011 Petros Efstathiadis

With Petros, there are no ancient columns nor pristine islands. “The notion of Greece with its blue skies, sandy beaches and happy people, all the clichés, is not the heart of this country.” It’s a radically different landscape, one of a Balkan Greece stained with Eastern colors, which the photographer is showing at Hyères. Another spatial and temporal reality is a movement against a general forgetting of what this continent went through in the past that his pictures become a reminder of.

The style is realistic, the look uncompromising and the violence diffused. However, Petros’ Greece has nothing in common with the country which is outlined on our TV screens. Everywhere, poetry: in models’ eyes, in installations’ fragility, in the vibrant look to the past, in fake petrol bombs’ harmlessness. Petros is ready to fight but only with flowers, “la fleur au fusil” as we say in French.

Bomb #1, Bombs, 2012 Petros Efstathiadis.

And what about his process? Petros calculates as much as he improvises. He starts by writing down his ideas – which can take quite long. Then it’s time for construction, letting surprise elements come into it. The composition completed, he takes a few photographs, destroys everything and then puts everything back where it belongs. A laborious process which accelerates incredibly at the time of shooting in order to better accentuate the act of photography. What Petros does, in other words is recompose reality. And really, what is photography other than reconstructing reality? Perhaps more than Greece, it is this love of the medium that the jury wanted to reward.

This year, it is Greece that won. A Greece that smells like powder and adds some flowers to its Molotov cocktails. A Greece far away from postcards and not so close to the sad reality. A Greece revealed by a particular eye. By Aurélie Laurière in collaboration with Girls meet Paris pour la version française cliquez ici

Petros Estathiadis Hyères 2013 photo by Girls meet Paris

All exhibitions can be seen until May 26^th

One of our favourite features of Shopbop are the Editor's picks and lookbooks, updated quite frequently to fit the emerging trends at the moment with a magazine-meets-boutique approach to online shopping. Their lookbooks get frequent mentions in Vogue, Harper's Bazaar, and Elle. The nice part about shopping with them is they include pieces from over hundreds of brands in all price ranges as it actually started as an online boutique specializing in hard-to-find denim lines. There are more than 400 designers including some of our favourites: Derek Lam, Hakaan, Alexander Wang, Theyskens' Theory, J.W. Anderson, Linda Farrow, Peter Som, Jason Wu, Rue de Mail, and more. Enter Eclectic Society's Giveaway to start your summer wardrobe!

Here's some of our Eclectic picks from Shopbop's site that we'd love for our dream Spring Summer wardrobe. It's all about letting those signature pieces and accessories reign this season!

Missoni Espadrilles / Bop Basics Ibiza Tote

Kenneth Jay Lane Necklace / Theyskens' Theory Silk Top

Jason Wu Jourdan Cross Body Bag / Rebecca Minkoff Bazzle Flat Sandals

RULES FOR ECLECTIC SOCIETY 100$ SHOPBOP GIFTCARD GIVEAWAY:

To enter, just fill in the Rafflecopter form below. There is a maximum of 8 possible entries per person, and the winner will be selected at random. The giveaway ends on the 9th of June and the winner will be emailed and announced via our site and Twitter on June 11th. This giveaway is open worldwide to all residents over 18.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Prize: 1  winner will receive a 100 USD gift voucher from Shopbop that can be used throughout their website. To check out their range of goodies, visit http://www.shopbop.com/. Good luck everyone!

Brooklyn based American indie band The National is releasing their sixth album, Trouble Will Find Me. The album release is the 20th May on i-tunes via 4AD Records. The album is full of guests including Richard Reed Parry of Arcade Fire. If you don't know this indie band that has been on the scene for the past decade, their sound has been compared to Joy Division and  Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds.

Last month, The National added another notch for launches with the premiere of the documentary Mistaken for Strangers at New York City's Tribeca Film Festival. The documentary chronicles the lead singer's brother Tom Berninger's experience of touring with the band. With summer just around the corner, The National will be kicking off the festival season with  Bonnaroo in June, two of Europe's biggest festivals Roskilde Festival and Rock Werchter in July, then returning to North America for Lollapalooza in August.

Sea of Love is The National's first video release from their new album. If you are good with references, you will see the video pays tribute to Russian punk rock band Zvuki Mu's song Grubiy Zakat (Грубый Закат).

images via tfs

10. Blue is the Warmest Color (La Vie D'Adele, Chapitre 1 & 2) by Abdellatif Kechiche
A teenage love story of Adele who unexpectedly falls in love with another girl, Emma, with striking blue hair. Adele finds it hard to cope with the judgement of family and friends, reminding us of our own teenage hurdles and insecurites that we had to learn how to hide or accept.

9. Fruitvale Station by Ryan Coogler
Fruitvale Station won the Grand Jury Prize at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival and now is competing in Un Certain Regard. While the film may not be noted for a daring style or captivating dialogue, it is reminiscent of early John Singleton. It is the true story of the last day of Oscar Grant whose death in 2009 by a Bay Area police office  Johannes Mehserle shocked us.

8. Young & Beautiful (Jeune et Jolie) by François Ozon
French director François Ozon is known for his sexually charged films, you can probably judge by the title where this is going with his portrait of a teenage girl who decides freely to become a prostitue. Expect some controversy and a little provocation. Afterall, this is what French cinema at Cannes is all about.

Carey Mulligan in Inside Llewyn Davis

7. Inside Llewyn Davis by Joel and Ethan Coen
Joel and Ethan Coen set their new film in the Greenwich Village folk scene of the early '60s with a folk singer who just can't make it. Expect classic Coen humor and a secondary cast that includes Justin Timberlake. Inside Llewyn Davis is tipped to be a winner, if not Cannes then the Oscars.

6. Venus in Fur by Roman Polanski
Roman Poloanski's follow up to Carnage is another theater adaptation. Emmanuelle Seigner plays an actress dsperate to convince the director she is perfect for the role although she is the exact opposite.

5. The Congress by Ari Folman
Waltz With Bashir director Ari Folman is back with an animated story and live action about an aging washed up actress who agrees to sell her likeness to a studio, however her decision has unforeseen consequences.

4. Shield of Straw by Miike Takeshi
Why is Shield of Straw so high on our list? Because one our our Eclectic editors is a huge Miike fan. Based off of the novel Wara no Tate by Kazuhiro Kiuchi about a rich man with strong political ties who takes out an ad with a 1,000,000,000  yen as a reward to kill the man who killed his granddaughter. Starring  Tatsuya Fujiwara (who has grown up since Battle Royale).

Only Lovers Left Alive by Jim Jarmusch

3. Only  Lovers Left Alive  by Jim Jarmusch
Tilda Swinton, John Hurt, Mia Wasikowska, Anton Yelchin and Tom Hiddleston in a vampire movie by Jim Jarmusch, whats not to be excited about especially now that we can say goodbye to the teen vampire craze and have some adult fun!

2. The Bling Ring by Sofia Coppola
Probably Sofia Coppola's most action packed film to date (we are comparing the action scale to Somewhere). Based on the true story of a teenage fashionista group who burgled the stars of young Hollywood. The Bling Ring will be stateside soon, closing the Seattle Internation Film Festival next month.

1. Only God Forgives by Nicolas Winding Refn
Nicolas Winding Refn teams up with his "Drive" star Ryan Gosling once again this time set in Thailand as an English gangster in a brutal story of revenge, rage, betrayal and the lightness of redemption. Get ready for a bloody trip.

This season Gatsby fever has swept the fashion industry and Mui Mui, Prada, Badgley Mischka, Ralph Lauren, the Brooks Brothers, Tiffany & Co. and Oscar de la Renta are just some of the designers that are using Daisy Buchanan and Fitzgerald as inspiration for their collections.  For the men, Brooks Brothers and Ralph Lauren have taken to the drawing board to produce collections worthy of the jazz age but with enough dapper nuances to be worn today.  On the ladies side Muccia Prada and Badgley Mischka have both created a collection of floor skimming evening gowns and quant cocktail dresses that mix luxurious textiles and asymmetrical architecture. While Swiss designer Fogal, Tiffany & Co. and Oscar de la Renta took care of the accessories with glitz up art deco inspired legwear (tights, thigh-highs and knee highs), jewellery and handbags respectfully.  When doing this trend a plethora of different materials like sequins, beads, feathers, velvet and silks are key.  However unlike the bohemian rhapsody looks from the hobo 2006 era, art deco should be done in cleaner cuts and more calculated pairings.  For an adventurous night out use Marc Jacobs as inspiration and hit cinematic notes yourself with a futuristic sequined cotton candy shift and pastel bob.  Or try an androgynous twist with 1920s menswear accessories like a bowler hat or a metallic jazz shoe to make this look your own.

Great Gatsby exhibit at Prada New York SoHo store

For a place to wear all of these fabulous designs on Tuesday Prada opened a Great Gatsby exhibit at their New York SoHo store with a collection of all of the Prada designs featured in the Great Gatsby film.  The exhibit started with a star studded cocktail party with director Baz Luhrmann, Carey Mulligan, Tobey Maguire and Isla Fisher all in attendance.  Across the pond in London even Harrods is getting in on the action with a pop up bar from May 9 to May 20.  Whether you channel Gucci with a beaded evening dress or go for a modern cubic printed sweatshirt from Alexander Wang, the key to wearing this trend is elegance this season. By Porschia Thomas

The Great Gatsby costumes by Catherine Martin

Emerging fashion designer Frank Tropiano maybe a Ohio native, but since his days at Parsons School of Design, New York has become his adoptive city. Frank takes us around to some of his favourite places and encourages us to explore what downtown New York has to offer!

Shop at:  The Comme Des Garçons store, Opening Ceremony, and Oak NYC. There are several concept shops around Bleecker Street to explore for established brands and emerging eclectic designers.

Eat at: In addition to Tomoe Sushi in the West Village, I also love Scarpetta in the Meatpacking District. They have the best bowl of pasta I have ever had in my life (no offense to my Grandma).  And this being NYC, pizza is always a must.  I really love Nonnas LES Pizzeria.  Also, Motorino in the East Village has a pizza with Brussel Sprouts that is awesome!

Drink at:  I think my favorite bar in NYC is 7B or Niagara,  both or are in the East Village.  These are the first bars I would go to when I first moved to NYC, and they are still 2 of my favorites.

Clockwise: Thompson LES, Twin Shadow, Scarpetta, The Jane Hotel

Listen to:  My favorite place to see a show is probably The Music Hall of Williamsburg is a great venue although it isn't downtown it is worth a mention...I saw a great Future Islands show there a while back.  I still listen to a lot of Wu-Tang Clan, Joy Division, and Radiohead.  I also really like Bear In Heaven, TV On The Radio, Beirut, Divine Fits, and Twin Shadow.

Stay at:  The Bowery Hotel is great, and it is a fun place to party too.  I also like the Thompson LES.  Besides cool rooms, they also have a great bar. Jane Hotel is beautiful as well.

Hidden Treasure:  This is tough, only because there are so many in NYC.  But I think favorite place to explore is the East Village.  I lived there for the vast majority of my time in NYC.  You can always find something new in the area…whether it be a restaurant, clothing store or bar.  I still think it is one of the creative centers of the city, and the energy there is great. I used to live right next to the old Location of Obscura on 10th and Ave. A.  I would always go into the store on my way home from class at Parsons.  Its a great place.

Clockwise: The Bowery Hotel, Niagara, snapshop of fashion designer Frank Tropiano

Mulberry's Willow tote comes in variety of summery colors, and is actually 2-in-1, as the front pocket can be used alone as a clutch.

Fendi's classic Peekaboo was first introduced in 2009, but it became such a hit, that they keep reinventing it with different materials and colors. This is perfect if you want to add a touch of lady-like sophistication to your outfit.

Antigona is a staple Givenchy bag, with structured form that is available in different materials and details each season. I like the classic matte black.

The new Diorling bag premiered for Spring /Summer 2013 with lovely pastel colors oozing cute sophistication.

A must have for Parisian chic is Betty by Saint Laurent that comes in medium and mini sizes and in a myriad of different  colors and details.

Gucci's Spring 2013 collection includes Bright Bit Shoulder Bag in beautiful jewel tones with the signature Gucci horse bit detail on the front. 

Givenchy Antigona's little sister, the Antigona clutch, is now available in bold, striking colors for this summer. 

This discreet looking foldover clutch from Balenciaga looks classy and elegant, and like all of their bags, it comes with a handy mirror.

This minimalistic, soft leather clutch by Céline Spring/Summer 2013 has quickly become the latest fashion must have.