Boasting massive ceiling installations, abundant natural light, and portals to endless literary possibilities, architecture is front and center at these visually arresting bookstores in China, giving bibliophiles something to love.
E Pang Bookstore
E Pang Bookstore is the first cultural complex of its kind in the Fengdong Free Trade Zone of Fendong New Town. More than a bookstore, the space evokes creativity and imagination in new generations. In China, where bookstores are not only retail spaces but also serve as gathering places for the public to read, Taipei-based firm Gonverge Interior Design conceived a futuristic design lined with wooden bookshelves and skylights to drench the nearly 38,000-square-foot space with natural light. The palette is organic with metal and stone forming display details that are punctuated by dark green elements for a dynamic visual identity.
Beijing Zhongshuge Lafayette Store
Referencing classical Chinese gardening techniques, each dramatic space in the X+Living-designed Beijing Zhongshuge Lafayette Store is devised to encourage consumers to explore. Arches nest and intersect to form bookshelves that unfold to unveil the depth of the space, enhanced by ladders and mirrored surfaces that create a surreal sensory impact. With glimpses of book-inspired wallpaper, moon gates (traditional circular openings in Chinese gardens) double as corridors that lead to an imagined bamboo grove with wooden branches hanging from the ceiling and the secluded study hall framed by glowing lamp boxes.
Capsule Hotel and Bookstore
Dreamy, forested Tonglu, in eastern China’s Zhejiang province, is the perfect setting for the nearly 2,500-square-foot Capsule Hotel and Bookstore. The bibliophile wonderland, which was designed by Shanghai-based Atelier Tao+C and named winner of the Open category at the 16th annual HD Awards, welcomes patrons into a serene retreat with walls of towering bookshelves fashioned from laminated indigenous bamboo planks—the centerpiece of the ground-floor public library, where regulars unwind and read at the gray brick-wrapped sunken seating area or a long, communal table.
Sinan Books Poetry Store
St. Nicholas Church in Shanghai may no longer host a congregation, but that does not render it any less holy. As the newest outpost for Sinan Books, the historic building has been transformed into a sacred space for poetry lovers. Updating the nearly 90-year-old structure was easier said than done for the retailer’s frequent collaborator Wutopia Lab. “Given the fact that no existing façade, structural system, basic floorplan, [or] distinctive interior decoration of the building could be changed, we built a metal bookstore apart from the old walls, leaving a [20-inch] gap between them,” says Yu Ting, chief architect at the Shanghai-based firm.
Photos by Weiqi Jin, Qingshan Wu, and CreatAR
