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David Wojnarowicz, the queer artist and Aids activist who rose to prominence in the 1980s, first drew a burning house in 1979. It would go on to become his artistic trademark: a symbol of rage and resistance that later inspired the name of Aimee Bea Ballinger’s bookshop.
Burning House Books was born out of Ballinger’s own frustration with the traditional publishing industry in 2016, after she read Wojnarowicz’s memoir, Close to the Knives – the first title she sold. Now located in Glasgow, the shop is known for its emphasis on art, experimental writing, counterculture and queer history. Alongside contemporary releases, its shelves hold first and second editions on cultural figures and artists, such as Cookie Mueller and Namio Harukawa.
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Climax Books in Clerkenwell is concealed behind a glass door covered in pink-tinted vinyl. There are no books in the window. Instead, an original artwork – such as a self-portrait by Sarah Lucas – hangs in a gallery-style box. It doesn’t look like your typical bookshop, which is fitting, because it’s anything but.
Former Dazed editor Isabella Burley founded Climax in 2020 as an online seller of specialist books and archival material on radical counterculture, Japanese erotica and cult image-makers – Wong Kar-wai, Kyle MacLachlan, Madonna. It now occupies two physical spaces: one in the East Village, New York, and one in London. Inside, the space is fitted with floor-to-ceiling mirrors, tactile latex seating and a single stainless-steel shelving unit. The interiors – designed by Kat Milne – provide a suitably provocative backdrop for the tight edit of subversive books and ephemera.
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A brilliant red awning signals Jonkers Rare Books on a particularly picturesque stretch of the Thames in Oxfordshire. As its name suggests, this charming bookshop is something of a purist: only the finest rare gems are for sale here. They span numerous genres and price points, from modest collectables to the museum-worthy – a £60,000 first edition of Casino Royale by Ian Fleming is a case in point.
Fitted with bespoke wall-to-wall bookshelves and cabinetry – the most precious titles displayed behind glass – the shop is designed to encourage the perusal of its rich collection of modern fiction, early 19th-century literature, illustrated children’s books and first editions, as well as manuscripts and artwork.
In 2005, the late Claire de Rouen revolutionised access to niche fashion, art and photography books when she opened her namesake store above a sex shop in Soho. Now directed by Chantal Webber and Dominic Bell, Claire de Rouen lies beneath the railway arches on Kingsland Road in Dalston, but, 20 years on, its spirit remains the same.
The space unfolds across multiple rooms, has an industrial feel, with bare brick walls and dark wooden floors. It’s decorated with old neon signs from the original store and Modernist furniture from the east London design store Monument. Alongside selling rare, signed and out-of-print books on subjects from Memphis design to Mapplethorpe, Claire de Rouen is a cultural hub, hosting an ongoing programme of talks, exhibitions, screenings and performances.
Instagram: @clairederouenbooks
McNaughtan’s, founded in 1957, is the oldest second-hand and antiquarian bookshop in Scotland. It’s tucked beneath a Grade A-listed building in Edinburgh’s New Town, designed by the Neoclassical architect Robert Brown and completed in 1825.
The first thing you’ll notice at McNaughtan’s is the window display, where titles are beautifully poised within each pane. The books on offer here are as eclectic as they are esoteric: advanced copies of Harry Potter, illustrated manuals on card tricks, collections of philosophical essays and early 20th-century travel handbooks to far-flung countries, from Namibia to Burma, among them. In fact, McNaughtan’s claims to be home to thousands of books that are unlikely to surface online.
A little black book for leather, latex and rubber fanatics; a 1960s paperback of ‘gorgeous girls in boots’; a photobook on the interiors of Japan’s love hotels… Many of the rare and out-of-print books at Record 28 veer delightfully between the erotic and the obscure. There are also titles on music subcultures such as hardcore and psychedelic, artists including Richard Prince and Cindy Sherman, and eminent fashion designers – Rick Owens, Issey Miyake, Kim Jones.
Every volume has been hand-picked by owner Nick Mennell, who also designed the space himself. The exterior, with its large windows and glossy green tiles, draws visitors inside, where framed prints line white walls and low-hanging LED lights illuminate the room. The scheme is minimalist, with a single table in the middle of the room – a canvas for an ever-changing selection of books to be displayed.
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Dracula, David Hockney and Watership Down – at this bookshop in York, artist autobiographies sit alongside Gothic masterpieces and children’s classics alike. Founded by James Hallgate as a specialist crime-fiction dealer in 1993, Lucius Books now sources and sells influential titles spanning countless genres, many of which are signed, inscribed or first editions.
Following a three-year renovation project, the shop is housed within a Grade II-listed building, with a sleek, black-painted façade and gold signage, and minimal interiors characterised by white walls, wooden floors and exposed beams. There are four floors to explore – slow browsing is rewarded with discoveries such as the signed first UK edition of The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides or poetry collections by Sylvia Plath.
Before setting up shop in 2012, Joe Torr and Ben Holmes – who bonded over independent publishing while studying in Leeds – ran stalls at zine and art fairs, testing the appetite for niche print media in their home town. The pair became part of the wider revival of print culture in northern England, with Village Books going on to earn cult status in the city.
A shop and gallery space, it has become a go-to destination for self-published zines, art and photography books, as well as exhibitions dedicated to emerging and local artists. Its rare books selection, however, blends glamour and grit: photobooks on football culture and British construction appear beside titles on street cats and the cartel, as well as 1980s adult magazines, motorbike-culture titles and early issues of The Face and i-D. Village Books has a second outpost in Manchester.
Nocturne translates to mean a work of art dealing with evening or night, which makes it a most suitable name for this bewitching bookshop. Conjured by Flora Gau, formerly artistic director at Claire de Rouen, Studio Nocturne is a ‘purveyor of spells, books and art objects’, set across two floors of a converted carriage house in De Beauvoir Town.
The rare books here are beautiful but strange, dark and devilish. Tomes on the occult, mysticism and mythology sit beside obscure artist monographs – Distortions by André Kertész, featuring black-and-white nudes photographed in a funhouse, is an exquisite example of the treasures one might find in this trove. The interiors are deliciously dark too, with glossy ceilings, black-stained wood vitrines and low-hanging lighting – a scheme concocted by local architects Mitchell & Corti.
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In 1894, Bath-born bookbinder George Bayntun established a business devoted to traditional techniques, later acquiring the historic Rivière Bindery – originally founded in 1829 – in 1939. Today, the Bayntun-Rivière bindery operates from within the rare bookshop that bears his name, where books are still bound entirely by hand and gilded using 23½-carat gold.
Inside the shop, exquisitely restored first and illustrated editions are among the jewels here – Bambi: A Life in the Woods by Felix Salten, rebound in lime-green Morocco leather and decadently gilded with sprites and stars, is particularly enchanting. So too is the collection of untouched antique and second-hand books, many of them works of English literature. The volumes are displayed in antique glass cabinets and along wooden bookshelves, set against pale-green walls and parquet flooring
