Odd Bird Bookshop, offering new and used books, will host its grand opening celebration tomorrow, April 11, at 37 N. Main St., Suite 103, in Bel Air, Md. WMAR reported that "exchanging a popular pop-up business for one grounded in the Bel Air Armory Marketplace, the Odd Bird Bookshop grew out of Jessica Rosado's creative vision designed to be different."
"We just got a resounding response from the community being like, 'Oh my God! I love this!' or 'I love this detail!' or 'I love that you (or we) do a grownup book fair a couple of times a year,' " Rosado said. "And we bring back all of the classics from the '80s and the '90s--the Scholastic book fairs they had in schools, Baby-Sitters Club and Goosebumps books."
The inspiration behind opening a physical storefront was Rosado's 19-year-old daughter, Lyric Stoker. "Sensory overload often denied her the relaxed, family atmosphere her mother tried to bring to her business as it moved about," WMAR noted.
"Depending on the brightness of the lights, I tend to get headaches and I can't focus properly," Stoker said. "If a room is too hot, I can't focus. If there's too many loud noises, I can't focus. It's just the overstimulation becomes too much to function."
Rosado added: "My entire family has some sensory issues, a variety of them, whether it be the lights or fabrics or noises and things like that, so I knew this was something the community needed. I really truly built it for her, but I also know that there are so many people out there that struggle with the same sort of thing."
People have rallied behind the idea of a sensory-friendly, independent bookstore, donating both money and their time to help fulfill this vision. "I wanted that. I wanted community," said Rosado, "I wanted somewhere that people felt like, 'I'm going to my bookstore.' You know they had a hand in building this, and that was really important to me."