Photo by Shinya Suzuki via Flickr
For four years, the third-floor storefront at the Shops at Columbus Circle that once held Amazon Books sat dark — a fitting bit of irony for a space the online giant abandoned. Now there are books on the shelves again, and they’re being sold by a name that Brooklynites know well.
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Powerhouse Books opened in the former Amazon space on May 22, according to a Shops at Columbus Circle press representative. The Brooklyn-based independent publisher and bookseller has set up on the third floor, just above the Hugo Boss store, bringing a curated mix of books, stationery, and gifts to a mall better known for luxury fashion and Whole Foods.Powerhouse is not a newcomer to the trade. The company has published fine art, documentary, pop culture, fashion, and celebrity titles since 1995, and it runs the well-known Powerhouse Arena in Dumbo along with a shop at Industry City. The Columbus Circle store is essentially a rebirth of its Park Slope location on 8th Avenue, which opened in 2012 and recently went quiet; the company has said it is moving “kit and caboodle” across the river to the Upper West Side, a neighborhood it describes as overdue for a curated book, stationery, and gift store.
That sentiment may resonate with longtime neighborhood book lovers. When Amazon announced in 2022 that it would close all its bookstores, including the Columbus Circle outpost that had opened in 2017 as the chain’s seventh location, the move reopened an old hope around here for a true independent to fill the void — the kind once embodied by the late, great Coliseum Books, which sat just steps away at 57th and Broadway for decades.
The new store sits at the crossroads of 59th Street, Broadway, Central Park South, and Central Park West, inside the Deutsche Bank Center (the building formerly known as the Time Warner Center). More information is available on the Powerhouse Books website.
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