Where This Creative Guy Goes Glasses Shopping on Bleecker

Racked is no longer publishing. Thank you to everyone who read our work over the years. The archives will remain available here; for new stories, head over to Vox.com, where our staff is covering consumer culture for The Goods by Vox. You can also see what we’re up to by signing up here.

New York City has more stores than anyone could physically tackle, but somehow we always keep returning to the usual suspects. To break out of the rut, we've asked some local shopping and fashion gurus to provide their hidden retail gems—those unique stores around our fantastic city that we might not all know about. Cue the Beatles: We're about to get a little help from our friends.

Image via Yelp

Ramón J. Goñi is a New York-based director, cinematographer, and multimedia journalist. In the early years of his career, Goñi worked as a correspondent for BBC News and several other outlets. But in 2009, he mixed things up and began working in film direction and cinematography. To date, his work has been featured in publications like W Magazine and Vanity Fair, and has been seen on both SHOWstudio and Fashion TV.

He recently launched Swoon NYC, a one-stop creative agency and production house that specializes in developing innovative digital advertising for luxury beauty and fashion brands. Here, he shows us a place on Bleecker Street where he always finds the perfect frames.

I spend a lot of hours with my eyes fixed on a monitor, whether it's a camera screen, my editing station, or the never-ending emails popping up on my iPad. Glasses are a must to keep my eyes open, but I usually find it quite difficult to pick anything that fits me in the incredibly cold and harshly lit optician stores staffed by fairly impersonal skinny ladies in white lab coats. See Eyewear is the opposite of that. The people working there are actual human beings, not robotic Stepford Wives sitting on stainless-steel chairs.

Their selection, updated quite often with new models, reflects that spirit; minimal and reduced, but eclectic enough to fit your character. They combine the charm of a small boutique with the service of a well-rooted brand with nation-wide presence. If you're just looking for a nice pair of f-lasses (fake-glasses), this is also the place for it. Sometimes it's great to dress up, whether you are pretending be some sort of comic superhero from the 30s—I used to be a reporter in the city—or you're pursuing that retro look from Mad Men. If not, remember to bring your prescription. No lab coats around.

· See Eyewear [Official Site]
· Ramón J. Goñi [Official Site]
· All Shopping Confidential Posts [Racked NY]

SEE Eyewear

312 Bleecker Street New York, NY 10014