Most importantly: Where are you located, what are your hours, and do you have a particular focus in terms of the books you stock (is there a vibe or theme to the store)?
We’re located at 1104 South Braddock Avenue in Regent Square between Frick Park Tavern and Live Fresh Juicery. Our hours that run at least through the new year are:
Monday – Saturday 11-8
Sunday 11-6
Website: www.staygoldbooks.com
A new bookstore in the ‘burgh is always exciting, can you tell us a little bit about the story behind Stay Gold Books?
We were both teaching at Falk Laboratory School through the pandemic (Carrie – English Language Arts, Corey – librarian), just after having two kids, and navigating active treatment for Carrie’s breast cancer when we decided we wanted to make a change. Running a neighborhood bookshop was a latent dream that Corey had largely inspired by his Dad’s own dream without any real sense of it as possible reality. But we kept talking about it, so Carrie spearheaded the business plan which majorly helped to coax the idea into reality. We only ever planned to be on Braddock Ave. in Regent Square (down the street from our Park Place house) and the space where we ended up was the first (and only one of two) that we looked at. We got a great help from a kickstarter campaign, researched, and planned and here we are.
What’s been the best / most surprising thing about opening your own bookstore?
The best thing is talking to anyone who happens upon our shop! Getting to know folks in the neighborhood (or visitors) is so important to us. Our collection of books is a mix of our recommendations across age and genre along with books suggested or inspired by our customers. It’s a neighborhood book store, and it feels super important to be in touch with our neighbors.
Most surprising was probably meeting Mister Rogers’ son who gave us a trolley pin after commenting on our array of Mister Rogers books and pictures.
I’m also curious to hear the answer to “the most challenging thing about opening up your own bookstore” (but no pressure if you want to keep this breezy)…
Do you have any hopes and dreams for the store in the coming years that you don’t mind sharing?
Part of our business plan is serving good drip coffee and tea along with some snacks and cold drinks. We want to encourage people to relax in the shop — it’s a pretty small store, but we have comfy seats and good vibes. We’re in the process of getting this all put together, but it takes time.
Another thing is serving some local schools for book fairs. When Corey was at Falk School he got White Whale in to replace Scholastic. Now that we’re on the other side of that equation, we’d like to work to provide local schools with an independent bookstore option for book fairs.
Any book recommendations you’d like to share, what are y’all reading now?
Corey recommends: Creation Lake by Rachel Kushner and The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store by James McBride. First one is new while McBride’s has been out for more than a year. Both fiction with a lot to say about real stuff. My book club just read Carmilla by Jospeh Sheridan Le Fanu (1871) with footnotes by Carmen Maria Machado and it was excellent!
Carrie is reading The God of the Woods by Liz Moore, but she’s not far enough in to go deep on a recommendation. She recently finished I Was A Teenage Slasher by Stephen Graham Jones and highly recommends it.
We both recommend The Message by Ta-Nehisi Coates.
Stay Gold hosts in-store events with local and visiting authors, as well as other creative and literary events like book clubs… can you give us some highlights for the coming month?
We’re really excited to host Alicia Roth Weigel (author of the memoir ‘Inverse Cowgirl’) for Intersex Day of Solidarity and Remembrance on Friday 11/8 at 6:30 PM. She’s an intersex activist, writer, and advocate for psychedelics to treat trauma. Alicia will be in conversation with local intersex activist, yoga instructor, and influencer Lyss Ball. We are encouraging RSVPs because we can comfortably seat 22 and then it’s standing room only!
Carrie’s Sunday Morning Salon Book Club will be discussing Ta-Nehisi Coates’ new one, The Message, on Sunday November 24th at 10AM.
We’re also taking part in the Edgewood Community Read of ‘American Sirens’ by Kevin Hazzard. On Monday, November 4th at the Edgewood Club we will be selling copies of American Sirens at a screening of the WQED documentary “Freedom House Ambulance: the FIRST Responders.”
For more events and information about Stay Gold Books, stop by the store or visit staygoldbooks.com!
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