Photographer-turned-blogger Scott Schuman, better-known as The Sartorialist, is one of the social web’s greatest success stories. In 2005, after quitting his full-time job to take care of his baby daughter, Shuman began carrying a camera around the streets of New York, documenting styles and fashions that caught his eye, then posting the images on his blog. Considered a pioneer of fashion photography in the blog medium, Schuman soon amassed an enormous, almost cultish following and eventually even published a book. A Visual Life is a poetic microdocumentary putting Schuman on the other side of the camera and chronicling his daily creative process. He calls his work a “digital park bench” — a new, digitally empowered way to people-watch across distance, geography and social divides.

It’s almost like going out there and letting yourself fall in love a little bit every day, letting yourself be seduced a little bit every day.” ~ Scott Schuman

We’re particularly taken with, and identify with, his passion-first, figure-it-out-as-you-go-along approach to his work:

My lack of knowledge in the beginning really helped and really just made me refine what little I knew to make it work.” ~ Scott Schuman

For more of Schuman’s beautiful visual cultural anthropology, we highly recommend The Sartorialist: (Bespoke Edition) — an elegant deluxe volume featuring 512 pages of Schuman’s finest work.

via texturism