WAYPOINTS: Imagined Things Bookshop, Harrogate
Imagined Things Bookshop, Harrogate Montpellier Quarter (Image: www.imaginedthings.co.uk)
After a decline since around 2012, the UK book industry has grown in the last couple of years, stimulated by the emergence of digital format books; indeed, as a Mintel report in 2024 noted, 4 out of 10 book purchases were digital or eBook.
Despite an increasingly digital world, demand remains to keep some things old school. Bricks and mortar outlets need to innovatively evolve to retain a place on the bookshelf for the good old fashioned physical book.
In a hip part of Harrogate centre, 21 Montpellier Parade, appropriately bookended by Betty’s and the Crown Hotel and populated with high end clothes, furniture, cafes, bars and arts and crafts shops, sits the “Imagined Things Bookshop”.
The independent shop, established by owner Georgia in 2017, and originally based in Westminster Arcade, has gone from strength to strength, and the current location provides a more accessible location and all important greater bookshelf space.
The shop provides an eclectic mix of reading material, ranging from literary classics, latest best sellers, fiction and non-fiction to international translated novels, poetry and self help books. There is also a range of bookmarks, postcards and other book related paraphernalia.
Inside Imagined Things Bookshop (Image: www.imaginedthings.co.uk)
There is an extensive range of children’s books and the shop has links with schools to help promote the benefits of reading whilst hopefully helping sustain printed matter. This a range of help from supply of books, National Book Tokens, World Book Day support and Class visits to the Bookshop.
Georgia and her team offer appropriate literary guidance to visitors to the shop and there are also helpful notes dotted around the shop with recommendations and such like. Should you wish there’s also an opportunity to discuss your book purchase and join a Book Club which meets monthly!
If you can’t visit in person, the shop also offers a mail order service.
Right from looking in the storefront window to browsing the collections dotted around the shelves, it is clear that the space reflects the owner’s lovingly curated, unique vision.
In an sector dominated by giants such as Amazon, it is great to see an independent business co-exist, prosper, and be rewarded for creating something special from fulfilling its imagination.
Phone: 01423 391301
The shop typically opens Mon-Sat 10-5 and Sun 12-4
