There are a million reasons to visit ant bookstore, but here’s why you need to visit The Last Bookshop in Bristol, a Park Street gem.
If you have walked down Park Street before, you may have noticed a bright orange storefront, announcing to passers-by that all books are £3.
This seems too good to be true, you may think to yourself (I know I first did when I first walked into what is now my favourite bookshop), but The Last Bookshop exceeds all expectations.
The last bookshop in Bristol
Every book is, in fact, £3. They are also all new (except for a small shelf at the back of the store stocked with second-hand books).
There are all different types of books: young adult, children’s, fiction, non-fiction, sport, science, autobiographies, classics, poetry, cookery books, art books, design and fashion, travel books… you name it they have it.
They even have a brilliant collection of coffee table books. Being able to pick up a gorgeous, brand new, weighty book on design, cookery, art, fashion, or sport is genuinely a massive steal. When the original price on the back of the book says £25.99 (yes, this has actually happened more than once) you feel over the moon being able to take it to the counter and pay for it with just three-pound coins.
The story behind the last bookshop in Bristol
Bill & Ben Books, the independent bookselling operation behind The Last Bookshop, is run by Jake Pumphrey and Nick Walsh. They are not, and have never been ‘traditional booksellers.’ The idea for their business stemmed from the huge amount of waste created by the publishing industry.
Many more books are printed than sold, which results in stacks of books just taking up space in warehouses. Pumphrey and Walsh recycle the remainders, returns and samples, as well as the office copies and overstocks.
‘We work hard to give them a second life,’ they say.
This does mean that there rarely are new releases or recent bestsellers in the store, but with such a wide selection, it hardly matters.
There are two other stores run by Bill & Ben Books, both of which are in Oxford.
The Book Stop, 19 Magdalen Street, Oxford, OX1 3AE, Tel: 01865 792681
The Last Bookshop, 25 Walton Street, Oxford, OX1 2HQ, Tel: 01865 445588
You can find the Bristol store here: The Last Bookshop, 60 Park Street Bristol, BS1 5JN, Tel: 01179 227998