Persephone Books

This is a very sweet and beautifully laid out bookstore. It prints literature that has been woefully neglected. The staff are welcoming and extremely knowledgable. Definitely worth a visit and don’t be surprised if you leave with lots of books.

I really like the font they use. Is this a weird thing to lead with?
So, the schtick is that «Persephone Books reprints neglected fiction and non-​fiction by mid-​twentieth century (mostly women) writers». Walk into their charming HQ on Lamb’s Conduit and it feels like… hmm…calm chaos? The staff are always kind, and never rush, but also have their own things happening in the back rooms. The books are on labeled shelves, but also have massive spill-​over onto big tables, medium sized tables, anywhere books can sit! The resulting visual is a book lover’s delight: beautiful dove grey-​covered books AS FAR AS THE EYE CAN SEE!
Back to the design elements: all of the books have a beautifully neutral and classy-​like-​whoah grey cover. However, flip the books open and their ‘endpapers’ are bright and bold reprints of art and textile. I’m a big fan of the Bloomsbury Group of artists, so seeing Duncan Grant reprinted in my first Persephone Books purchase just made it all the more sweet. Grab a few bright bookmarks, too.
I challenge you to go into Persephone Books and _​not_​find a book of interest. From humour to biography to history to poetry, they’ve got it. I especially love gifting the books on London and British life to friends. «Good Things in England» was my first Persephone Books purchase, containing more than 800 British recipes dating back to the 14^th century — a great exercise in culinary anthropology.
Price? Love that they’re the same, ‘cross-​board. A very affordable 12 GBP each; or, 3 for 30.
My Mom occasionally sends me a voucher to get a freebie when she thinks I need a pick-​me-​up (NOTE: AWESOME GIFT, MA, YOUDABESTEST) so just a headsup if you’re in the need for a gift but can’t decide: this is a great route to go.
Unilocal note: they also have a growing audiobook and e-​book collection, though I really think that these are books you want to physically hold on to and collect.

On my list of stores to visit while in London, I’ve been getting the Persephone Biannually for a couple of years, ever since hearing about this publisher in an issue of the now defunct Domino magazine. I was pretty psyched that this location was not too far from where we were staying in Bloomsbury, and took a stroll on a lovely Friday morning to take a peek.
It also happens to be their main office, so the back was abuzz with work being done. The shop lady who came i when I was browsing was particular helpful and sweet. We chatted a bit about my visit and the title I finally decided on. I also got some pretty postcards, illustrations of the storefront.
An amazing selection of books, women writers who have faded into obscurity but with the help of Persephone Books are gaining a new audience the second time around. Their books are beautiful to display on your shelf as well!

I love this bookshop. Old, out of print novels, republished in a small, calm shop on a lovely street. I always end up getting something when I come here. Books are priced at a bargain £9.

A lovely little bookshop selling reprints of forgotten 20^th century women authors. Not everything they sell really deserves its reprint, but many do (as a number of quotations by famously insightful authors and critics makes clear). The editions are beautiful in dove gray covers with pretty patterns inside (often fabric patterns) and matching bookmarks. You certainly couldn’t do all your book shopping here but it is a lovely place to while away half an hour discovering new things, and the books make excellent presents.

This storefront is actually the headquarters of Persephone Books publishing group, a company that rights the wrongs of history by shedding some much-​needed spotlight on neglected women authors of the past.
Because they do all their business out of this little spot on Conduit Street, the shop bit on the front end feels like a bit of an afterthought. Persephone sells most of their books via their website or through specialty bookstores, so their own store is not really made for browsing. Still, this lends the space a certain charm as you wander through the piles of books and peak into the back of the store where employees are chatting animatedly on the telephone, no doubt negotiating a new publication or a movie deal for one of their books (they re-​printed «Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day» which is now a Major Motion Picture starring Amy Adams and Frances McDormand).
On my first visit, I was determined to enjoy my experience visiting Persephone, if only because I’d already fallen in love with their business concept. I spent about fifteen minutes reading the titles of each book and flipping through a few of them. They are all beautifully bound in gray paperback with distinctive colorful endpapers. Though I didn’t buy anything on this trip (it was the pre-​Christmas rush which made the storefront even more hectic than it probably is normally), I plan to come back in the next few months to make my first purchase and spend more time browsing.
If you make a visit, also check out the cool bookmarks they sell featuring those funky endpaper prints (free with purchase!). They also have some cool tote bags and a separate section of «Books We Wish We’d Published» if you’re looking to expand your horizons to some non-​Persephone titles.

A totally unique place — this isn’t really just a bookshop, it’s a concept and a mission as well. The idea is that it reprints forgotten books from the 20^th century by mostly women writers — hence the name, Persephone — the ultimate in female fertility, the woman who could put every IVF doctor out of work by wrapping her legs around the earth from the gods.
It’s a cool concept, there are lots of reasons books go out of print and there are lots of reasons why some books take off and some don’t. Not all sort the wheat from the chaff — lots of good ones slip through the big publisher’s nets. Its ultra specialised admittedly but these people have passion and something from here can make a great present for someone with an interest in literature and this period.

Brilliant. Yes please. Can I have some more like this, I loved every little bit about it. Essentially Persephone Bookshop is a front, a front for a funky publishing company who are hell-​bent bringing out forgotten and obscure female novelists from the inter-​war period, which I find to be a very good thing.
Why? Because they are the most delightfully produced pieces of neo-​eccentricity coming out of the book market today, and all with a story, and an interesting blurb. Obviously so soon after visiting, I’m not able to tell you that their books are any good, but I trust they are. I was met by a very well-​spoken assistant who communicated her love of books so well. and the rest of this slender shop is devoted just to good books. Really good books. SO I was able to buy two, for a parent each. And felt smug and chuffed with my choices. Which is nice.
Really well laid out and arranged, clearly the labour of love from the publisher to the shop, I had myself a very nice time in this lovely little bookshop!

Small independent bookshops are becoming sadly rarer, so this publishing outlet is a gem. Situated in the amazing Lamb’s Conduit Street, aptly in the heart of literary Bloomsbury, it sells previously out-​of-​print works by female authors. The books are beautifully designed hardbacks with decorative covers, perfect as gifts.

I love this shop. It is very small but once inside I am happy because it sells books mainly by women novelists that had gone out of print. I have read nearly all of them now and have learnt a lot about how people lived in the 1930’s and 1940’s. In the main they are fictional works but there are a few cookery books and one on gardening too. The books have a beautiful plain grey cover and the end papers are all different (reproductions of fabrics.) They have recently published some of their more popular books with illustrations on the front cover. They also sell book marks, cards, etc.

This little bookstore is appropriately situated in the heart of Bloomsbury: home to the famed Bloomsbury Group of the early 20^th century which comprised the likes of Virginia Woolf, John Maynard Keynes and EM Forster. The store is the face of the eponymous publishing house which discovers «neglected», meaning out-​of-​print diaries and novels by women authors from the early 20^th century. While some of these novels seem to be neglected with due reason, and some of the publisher’s choices are dubious, there are enough diamonds among the rough to intrigue anyone interested in the era or women writers. These books would make an ideal and thoughtful present for a favourite female friend who might herself be a too-​oft neglected diamond in the rough.