Bookish Gift Guide | Support The Independents

Whether you’re organised with your Christmas shopping or completely at a loss so far, I feel like December is a month full of browsing. Even if you have your life together and everything sorted, isn’t it just interesting to see what’s out there? I certainly think so.

Well, I’m coming at you today with some of the independents. Wherever possible, I try to buy from independent businesses who are more likely to appreciate the money I spend than big corporations would. Of course, it’s not always avoidable. Buying from the big places can work out cheaper, quicker, more convenient in general. BUT…I do try to support the independents. And so I thought I’d create a lil bookish gift guide, suggesting not only some bookish gift ideas but specifically linking you folks to indie shops I think deserve more attention. 

Note: With this going up at the beginning of December, PLEASE check each places’ last orders for shipping in time for Christmas before ordering!

Literary Book Gifts

Literary Book Gifts is a website dedicated to bookish shirts, hoodies and tote bags. The absolute go-tos for stylish book merch, I always love finding new websites with all their designs and fangirling. But what I love about this one in particular is that not only did I find merch for the typical classics or popular bunch, but also for the books that don’t often get much of a highlight for merch. I had the chance to work with Melissa – the owner of Literary Bookish Gifts – on a video review and lookbook featuring two of the shirts from the website, so if you’d like to see a more in depth talk about the products you can see that here. But I decided to go for the Jane Austen and The Iliad shirts, and I was beyond thrilled to find merch for anything relating to ancient Greek literature. I’ve not found much so far! So if you’d like to have a lil peep at the website and see if there’s anything for you, you can check out the website here!

I don’t know what the pose is about either, don’t worry

Taryn Draws

Taryn Draws can be found on both Etsy and Society6, but I basically found this gal through Twitter and fell in love with her illustrations. Though not specifically bookish, I feel like a lot of her artwork would be something fellow bookworms like me would adore. I literally want to cover my entire wall with it. She has a gorgeoussss style of illustration that seems to be fairytale-esque and her designs often feature witches or popular fandoms – one in particular being Fantastic Beasts/Harry Potter. I’m hoping to purchase myself a lil something from one of her stores in the new year, so I couldn’t resist sharing her talent on here too!

Note: More designs and products are featured on the TarynDraws Society6 store than Etsy, but I thought I’d include both!

Big Green Bookshop // Independent Bookshops

I know the majority of us would love to support the indie bookshops whenever we can. Again though, it’s not always possible in terms of cost and location. However…I just had to include this one because I’ve had a recent revelation that made all this a whole lot easier. 

A lot of indie bookshops allow you to order online. I know, shocking. For some reason the thought just never occurred to me. But a few months ago I saw The Big Green Bookshop – a bookshop in London – taking book orders through twitter and thought “wait…I can do that?!” And so here we are.  This Christmas, if the cost of a book isn’t too different on websites like Amazon than it would be at standard price, or you can stretch a bit further to cover the cost, why not see if there’s an indie bookshop you can order from? If they don’t have a specific website to order through, see if they have any social media where they might take orders. The Big Green Bookshop often take orders through twitter – I ordered from there myself not too long ago – and it’s as simple as sending over a tweet asking if they have a book, being told the price, sending your name and address via DM and using PayPal to send the money over! 

Holly Dunn Design

Holly Dunn is someone I’ve discovered recently and just fell in love with her work immediately. She’s a book designer and runs her own online shop, featuring bookmarks, notebooks, greeting cards, tote bags and even lil magic textbooks. Her works are stunningly intricate and are inspired by a wide range of books – I particularly adore her fairytale collection (is anyone surprised?). 

Literary Gift Company

Again, we have another website I’ve discovered lately and just absolutely adore the look of. Literary Gift Company is exactly what it says it is – a place for literary gifts. I’ve included this one because while it has the usual notebooks and tote bags, this website goes so much further. Fancy some literary homeware? Stocking fillers? Jewellry? Wrapping Paper? This website has got you covered. I love trawling through it and just seeing all the merch they managed to come up with – everything from Lady Macbeth’s Guest Soap  to Dracula Doormats and Plant Pot Bookends. Talk about being #OnBrand in every way possible 😆 

So there we have it! Those are some of my suggestions on how to support independent businesses while shopping for bookish gifts this Christmas! Of course, there are SO many more businesses out there that I could shout out and wish to buy from, but then we’d be here for eternity. So I’ll leave that to you folks – go forth and snoop through them all!

Until next time,