A round-up of Providence bookstores
There’s nothing quite like an independent bookstore to let your mind wander and just take a break. The Brown Bookstore is convenient and easy, but where’s the fun in that? Now that the weather has finally started to resemble spring, it’s the perfect time to get off campus and check out all the cool things Providence has to offer. Here’s our round-up of some of the best local bookstores (all in walking distance!).
The closest independent bookstore to campus, Books on the Square (Wayland Square, that is) feels like your best friend’s bookshelf. It doesn’t have rare books or an alternative vibe, but the place is welcoming and has a wide range of books. You can find bestsellers along with indie picks of the week, local authors, and even art supplies. The fiction section has staff recommendations and Indie Booksellers recommendations to make the overwhelming number of options a little more manageable. Although not directly applicable to Brown students, there is also an extensive children’s section and a super comfortable reading couch in the back. You’re bound to find a book you like there, and even if you’re not looking to read, they sell coloring books, cookbooks, and beautiful stationery (always my favorite part), along with socks and soap; what more do you need? A short 15 minute walk from campus, Books on the Square is the perfect place to look for a fun read and waste some time browsing knick knacks.
Almost an antithesis to Books on the Square, and only a few hundred feet away, Paper Nautilus is exclusively secondhand books in a beautiful space, complete with barnacles and other ocean-y things made from book pages (including Twilight). The store has the classic fiction, history, biography etc, but also sections like beverages, occult, and letters. While you might not find books published within the last year, the stores boasts an impressive array of obscure and interesting reads with a knowledgeable staff. However, if you aren’t looking for books, it’s still worth the trip for the random antiques. The things they sell feel a bit like a garage sale, but the whole basement is full of little trinkets and strangely nice scarves, while upstairs has random plates and vases scattered among the books.
Cellar Stories, located just off of Westminster Street, is truly a hidden gem. Tucked away in the upstairs of a small building, it is the largest used and rare bookstore in Rhode Island, packed floor to ceiling with tens of thousands of little treasures. Its rickety wooden bookshelves and decorative old-school book presses mixed with that old book smell will feel like home to bibliophiles everywhere. As with many used bookstores, it has that slightly messy, grandma’s-attic kind of vibe. Although Cellar Stories focuses primarily on an eclectic combination of Rhode Island History, New England History, Art and Architecture, Modern First Editions, Poetry, and Math, its offerings do not end there. There are boxes of old playbills, sheet music, printing slugs, newspapers, CDs, maps and more for anywhere from fifty cents to three dollars. It also has an extensive collection of used comics and old Playboys (I don’t really have a good explanation for that one), along with oddly specific sections such as JFK conspiracy and oversized golf books. If that isn’t enough to convince you to stop in at Cellar Stories, I honestly don’t know what is.
Just around the corner from Cellar Stories, Symposium Books has the feel of a California bookstore you’d pop into after buying an artisanal coffee. The perfect indie bookstore for college students, it’s the kind of place that practically begs you to wander the aisles for hours. While the majority of the books are used, it has a fairly modern collection of contemporary novels and nonfiction, along with a huge selection of design, art, and architecture books. All the titles seemed to be in great condition and at a discounted price. Additionally, they buy and sell used records, carrying a substantial collection for as little as five dollars. As all good bookstores should, Symposium also offers various trinkets and fun objects, such as magnetic poetry, local soaps, and patterned socks. They also have their own clothing line, Book Nerd, full of t-shirts with some pretty wonderful book puns (my personal favorite is “The Comma Sutra,” featuring some strategically positioned commas). Located on Westminster Street, home to a ton of awesome shops, Symposium Books is definitely one you shouldn’t miss.Images via and Kyra Goldstein '19.
