Bookshop Cafe Heaven

Hello everyone! I hope you all had a lovely weekend. Now I was very keen to show you how much, or should I say, how little of our old house is left. Everything has gone, bar the laundry window and the bath. I even managed to give away our old, but still functioning, fridge plus other bits and bobs to Vinnie's (St Vincent de Paul's charity). Last week, Murray, a builder from Newcastle, came to take the windows and doors and uplift the floorboards that could be re-used (which only turned out to be a small area of the living room that used to be the verandah before it was covered).

But, although I have taken photos, I can't download them as the computer cord appears to have gone walkabout! So they will just have to wait. In the meantime, I thought I'd share some images of a renovated bookshop cafe in Manhattan that would have to be my ideal bookshop cafe and yet another reason why I'd love a trip to New York!

One of the largest independent booksellers in downtown Manhattan, McNally Jackson Books under went a revamp by Front Studio architects and they have managed to combine two of my favourite things - a good book and a quirky light fitting.

According to Front Studio, the cafe owner wanted to "re-conceptualize the café as a place evocative of literature". So books were used as part of the pendant lights and pages of books used to line the walls.

They describe the space as such: "A scattering of books hangs precipitously from the ceiling, as if a pile of books had been thrown into the sky and frozen. The curved wall surrounding the seating area is covered in wallpaper made entirely of open spine books, the texture of the print adds a rippling effect of restless pages."

"Running along the wall is a series of folding single tables, carefully crafted to resemble a folded book when closed. The new menu is made of food related quotes lit by four light fixtures, each dedicated to the many editions of a singular book."

Images courtesy The Contemporist

How cool is that?