The agency has designed an architectural project of nearly 400 m2 with the ambition of revealing this location with atypical volumes by working both on the verticality of the space, with large, full height shelving, and on its depth by punctuating the journey with strong markers. From the window, large totems display the literary new releases, while giving a strong visibility on the interior of the bookstore. Beyond the door, the fluidity of the customer journey – a key point of the renovation – has been redesigned to facilitate the movement between the different departments and encourage strolling both on the ground floor through the generous alleyways and through the mezzanine and corridors filled with books.

In the centre, the Agora can accommodate the many events and book signings and places the authors at the heart of the life of the bookstore. The general atmosphere is warm; customers move smoothly from an anthracite grey atmosphere – an incarnation of the city – to a brighter atmosphere towards the back of the space evoking the quietness of the libraries. The renovation of the original parquet floors anchors the store in the spirit of continuity. Dashes of “theatre” red – in reference to the institutional colour of the Gallimard House and the many venues of the district – energise the place.

“In our business where 60% of purchases are impulse purchases, we are seeing double-digit growth rates in the wake of each of the three bookstores”, says Philippe Touron, Director of the Madrigall Group’s Parisian bookstores.

The graphic identity of the bookshop, an integral part of the project, has also been redesigned by the agency. It is inspired by the collages, posters and manifestos that marked the times; We can thus write evocative words and put the faces of iconic personalities who lived in the neighbourhood on the walls.

The Librairie de Paris has taken a youthful look while keeping its soul intact! It is more than ever a key player in the neighbourhood “One of the crossroads of Paris where life is teeming, at the edge of the petty bourgeois world, that of workers and employees, or in other words, Bohemia and weddings” as written in 1954, Georges Simenon in Le Grand Bob.