A beautiful new Drawn & Quarterly store (211 Bernard St. W., Montreal) has opened in the city’s Mile End neighbourhood. The store acts as a book art gallery, curating select titles with a graphic novel tilt. Drawn & Quarterly has created a public presence in the heart of the neighbourhood where it has been based for 18 years, with a stage set for a regular program of book launches, exhibitions and workshops. According to D&Q publisher Chris Oliveros, the store hopes to become “a beacon for leading independent culture from home and abroad.
“We intend to focus both on local works (from D+Q to numerous Montreal publishers and authors in both English and French) to international works (many American publishers, as well as leading publishers from Europe and India). In short, our aim is to create a City Lights of Canada.” In addition to their own complete line of books and comics, the D+Q store will also bring a specialty selection of innovative literary comics, art books and novels from some of their “publishing peers” to the community at large.
Aside from Drawn & Quarterly titles, the store carries key titles from Fantagraphics and McSweeney’s, along with numerous Montreal publishers including Conundrum Press, Éditions La Pastèque, and L’Oie de Cravan. “We’re also very proud to be carrying major titles from the India-based publisher Tara Books, a silkscreen book publisher,” says Oliveros. And apparently the local community response has been very positive. “We’re very grateful that this project has been greeted with such enthusiasm.” The store is managed by Oliveros, Tom Devlin and Jamie Salomon, and employs two full-time book-sellers.Andrew J. Wright through its site links.