Independent Bookstores of the UK
We often get comments about some of our “picks of the day” for The Local Artisan Guide’s social media as sometimes our choices can seem a bit contrary to local artisans. We have overtime decided to include independent and small brands, artisanal foods, sustainable brands and one of our favorite picks, the local, independent bookstore.
In the United Kingdom, the land of Shakespeare, books are highly revered. Neighborhoods everywhere have a local bookstore that offer books from authors old and new. What is special about the United Kingdom is their plethora of antiquarian bookstores. Here you can find ancient manuscripts and some of the earliest books ever printed. In the United States most antiquarian booksellers are carefully hidden away in office buildings in large cities. In the UK it is possible to just walk off the street and into a book lovers paradise. Imagine owning a Medieval manuscript carefully created from a monk centuries ago? Or a Renaissance book on medicine? Well in the UK there are many antiquarian bookstores that cater to this very need. These shops look so quaint and charming to boot that you have to go in to carouse just for the experience alone. Its enough to make you feel like Audrey Hepburn’s book clerk character in “Funny Face”.
In “Funny Face”, Audrey Hepburn played the bookish bookstore clerk for fictional, Greenwich Village independent bookstore, Embryo Concepts Book Shop.
The UK also offers many bookstores that specialize in rare books. Want a signed copy of Ernest Hemingway’s “A Movable Feast”? Well chances are you can find it in the UK along with countless other authors and manuscripts.
With Amazon and Barnes & Noble gobbling up small bookstores around the world, we salute and highlight some of our favorite local bookshops we have seen so far in the UK. We realize we have only scratched the surface and look forward to highlighting many more, so if there is a local bookstore that you admire please let us know in the comments below.
The colorful facade of Sokol Books will draw you in, and once in you are privy to some of the world’s rarest and oldest books any collector of antiquarian would be honored to collect. 239A Fulham Rd, Chelsea, London, UK.
Maggs Bros. Ltd: Rare books and Manuscripts offers rare books and manuscripts from around the world in every topic imaginable. With two elegant destinations in Mayfair and Covent Gardens, it has a stellar reputation in the antiquarian world since 1853.
Peter Harrington Rare Books & Manuscripts specialises in selling and buying the finest quality original first editions, signed, rare and antiquarian books, library sets, maps and original manuscripts.
South Kensington Books is the quintessential independent neighborhood book store. Established in the 1940’s, South Kensington Books specializes in Visual Arts, Photography and Architecture and History besides fiction and nonfiction. 22 Thurloe St, Kensington, London, UK.
Daunt Books is an popular independent book store chain in London founded in 1990 and located in various local neighborhoods. Pictured is the Chelsea location. 158-164 Fulham Rd, London, Chelsea, UK.
Brick Lane Bookshop provides Shoreditch the local neighborhood bookshop experience for over thirty years. 166 Brick Lane, Shoreditch, London, UK.
Pages Cheshire Street is a sister shop to Clapton’s award-winning bookshop, Pages of Hackney. Pages Cheshire Street is an independent bookstore that showcases women, trans and gender diverse authors across many genres. 5 Cheshire St, Shoreditch, London, UK
Tackle & Books is one of the most photographed bookshops in the UK, Located in the picturesque town of Tobermory on the Island of Cull, Scotland, UK, Tackle & Books for over 35 years supplies such diverse products as books, computer food, artist materials, fishing tackle & business services. 7 Main St, Tobermory, Isle of Mull, Scotland, UK.
The Map House was established originally in 1907 as Map and Booksellers by Alfred Sifton and Francis Praed. Now it provides antiquarian maps from around the world.
The Local Artisan Guide is looking forward to exploring more local neighborhoods in London and around the UK. In the meantime we applaud the local independent bookshops that strive to survive in an Amazon world.
By Natalie Rivera