Reader's Haven

Hey fab people! Good news: Aristoc has finally caught up with the world's classy bookshop trend. You know, that comfy zone where a reader can go in, take a seat and browse away. You may walk in, take a book of  your choice off the shelf, take a seat and lose yourself in the wonderful world of bookland. Now, there's a reader's bliss - if like myself you love bookshops, and books make up part of your retail therapy; right up there with shoes, bags and chocolate, then you know what I'm talking about. This new look Aristoc has got itself has really been a long time coming here in Ug, seeing as bookshops the nature of Aristoc elsewhere in the world have had the make-the-reader-comfy style for ages now. It's part of what draws the clientele and we love it.

Aristoc's Garden City branch, when it came around some years back, was a very welcome addition to the Kampala road branch which was (still is) a bit more crowded and did not offer much to a book-store lover who goes in there to explore and find that perfect book. That didn't stop us going there (and shouldn't stop you either) their collection is vast and like they boast, they are Uganda's leading book-store.

Well, now they've expanded the branch at Garden City even more and you'll find comfy sofa's set up for readers, and benches that are extensions to the shelves where you can seat and leaf through that book before you take it home, or quickly browse through another good one that you may not be taking home for one reason or another- cost, interesting-but-not-one-you'd-really-like-to-take-home, et cetera. I snapped a few pics for you, you'll please forgive the blurry-ness; I took them with my phone as I didn't want to look too obvious pulling out my camera (which I carry everywhere by the way) and all.

Don't see why you (or anyone else) might want to sit in a book-store and read a book when you could just buy the book and go read it elsewhere? I'm surprised at you but let me enlighten you, poor soul.

• For many people (some of us, anyway), a book-store is a very pleasant place to be. You are surrounded by all these books about everything there's to know in the world and sometimes you just want to to sit and take it all in. Well, not really. It's too much to take it all in, but you want to read this, and that, compare authors' styles, discover new authors, et cetera.
• You want to know if that book is really worth spending your pennies on or not, and you may want to read a full chapter just to be sure (yeah,some of us actually do that!).
• Sometimes you find a book you've been looking for (badly!), only to discover that it's bigger than your pocket at the moment - buying it would create a dent in your purse, so big you might not get yourself any more niceties for the rest of that month. Ever had one of those moments? Yeah? Well, they happen in bookshops too. So you'll take seat (see?) and take in as much of this book as you can, memorising as much as you can, then put it back on the shelf and go home. You go away richer in knowledge, and with no holes in your purse. Clever, huh?
• I can think of a myriad other reasons I'd want a book-store to have a comfy zone but you can see where I'm going already so I'll keep it short and sweet and just say: try it out, it's what fab people do. You're fab, right?

And hey, for me that book I wanted so bad that would have cost my entire month's electricity bill (ha ha) is Harper's Bazaar - Fabulous At Every Age. Believe me people (ladies, sorry guys) you wanna get yourself that one. Some of you might even find it cheap. Actually I think that depends on what your budget looks like that month, or what time of the month it is. End of month = loaded, right? Anyhow, next month, I'm getting me that book. You better do too, you'll love it. What's more you'll look fab. Forever. Don't you just love those buys that leave you looking fab!


Au revoir! Much Love,

         Katerina.