Zora's Place, a Black-owned bookstore with an emphasis on Black women authors, artists, and entrepreneurs, will open in Evanston, Ill., in September, the Evanston Roundtable reported. The store has launched a crowdfunding campaign to help with the opening, which has so far raised more than $8,000.
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| L'Oreal Thompson Payton | |
The bookstore will open within Evanston's Aux Wellness Collective and sell titles for all ages. Self-help and wellness titles, along with books about race and social justice, will make up the nonfiction section, while adult fiction will include literary and speculative fiction, as well as a romance section.
The store's children's section will feature space for kids to sit and read, and the shop's event offerings will include storytime sessions, author readings, workshops, and book clubs. Alongside books, customers will be able to find stationery, candles, and other sidelines.
Owner L'Oreal Thompson Payton, an author, journalist, and yoga teacher, told the Roundtable that owning a bookstore had always been her "retirement dream," but while on a bookstore crawl in 2019, she was inspired by Café con Libros in Brooklyn, N.Y. "Then when the Black woman-owned bookstore Call & Response opened in Hyde Park, I thought, 'Why can't we bring this to Evanston?' " she recalled.
The Aux Wellness Collective, located at 2223 Washington St., opened earlier this year and is also Black-owned; it runs a variety of community programming including yoga classes taught by Thompson Payton. She remarked: "Evanston is very diverse, and the Aux makes perfect sense. There's a cafe and laundromat, and it seems like a natural place where people might want to get a book."
"We're creating a warm, intentional space where Black women can feel seen, supported, and inspired," said Thompson Payton.