Champaca Bookstore: An Interview with Nirica Srinivasan (Bookseller)
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Champaca Bookstore: An Interview with Nirica Srinivasan (Bookseller)
For a considerable amount of time, Secret Garden was concealed in a circular drive on Edward Road with only a couple of faithful cafes. At…
For a considerable amount of time, Secret Garden was concealed in a circular drive on Edward Road with only a couple of faithful cafes. At the point when eighteen months back, the restaurant shut shop , environmentalist/ecologist and conservationist Radhika Timbadia got her hands on the space to open up Champaca Bookstore, Library and Cafe. She has experience in community based wildlife conservation , the intersection between gender & environment , nature and education.
She holds a Master of Science(M.Sc) degree in Applied Ecology & Conservation from University of East Anglia & has travelled and worked in many places across India.
This library, book store and bistro has created a serious buzz in Bengaluru.
Radhika has conceptualized and planned Champaca as interestingly as could reasonably be expected.
The story behind the name? The bookstore “Champaca” is named after the flower Magnolia champaca or champa tree also known as sampige , golden champak or champa . It is common in the South India. The logo however also features a sambar and a drongo, both found in Southern forests. “We wanted the place to have an identity that was rooted here, in Bengaluru, and would represent the community,” says Nirica.
Independent in thought & spirit
Champaca is an independently-owned women-run bookstore and cafe, and a diverse community of people. They work together in curating the books which they keep on their racks or shelves , and manage the essential day-to-day activities of running the book shop.
Excerpts from the interview :-
Q1) Tell us about the journey of Champaca. What’s special or different about the bookstore? Who are the key people behind the bookstore and how did it begin? What was the vision and mission behind starting your own bookstore/book cafe and library?
Nirica : Champaca’s founder, Radhika, had the idea of starting a bookstore over two years before it actually came into being. She was part of a Library Educator’s Course by the Bookworm Trust, a fabulous organisation in Goa, which helped focus her ideas on how and why she wanted to do this. A team of people began curating the books and visiting distributors in November 2018, and the bookstore opened in June 2019. Now, we are a small team of curators and book-lovers, and we participate in all aspects of the bookstore.
Our main focus is on diversity, and we take care to bring that into our shelves, our children’s library, and our events. We choose the books we shelve with care. We believe that a good bookshelf should hold a world of voices and stories, from across time, place and experience. Whether it’s through underrepresented themes, like caste or feminism in both fiction and nonfiction, or underrepresented areas of the world, we choose books that we think deserve to be read. On our shelves, you’ll find books from caste narratives in rural India to dystopian futures where people can move the earth; moving personal memoirs on mental health to poetry bound in sari cloth; and translations from over twenty languages, from India and internationally.
Q2) What do you love most about being a bookseller? What do you think is the role of an independent bookstore, or the role of booksellers at an independent bookstore?
Nirica : We do think that independent bookstores are vital community-building spaces in any city, and we hope to build connections across independent bookstores as well, learn from each other, and help each other grow.
At Champaca, one of our aims is to build a community of readers, through our bookstore and through our events. Our community is a delight to meet and interact with. We love the kind of conversations that come up around books, and we often spend hours recommending books to customers and discussing our favourite reads. We try, through our events and the books that we stock, to be the kind of place that people can come to and interact with, and for all of us to learn from each other and find new ways of looking at our world. In the last few months, we’ve launched an online store, which has been exciting in that it allows us to expand our community through the digital space to so much further than just Bangalore!
Personally, my favourite part of being a bookseller is just that: getting to interact with other book-lovers, exchanging recommendations and learning from each other. I find that such an enriching experience.
Q3) How did the books you read helped you when you started to work as a bookseller?
Nirica : We’re a small team of curators, and we all have our own areas of interest and expertise. That’s one aspect of what makes our curation interesting — we each bring something different to the table! We shape our curation, whether it’s through a focus on wildlife and ecology, queer stories, feminist writing, translations from regional languages, or just good fiction we love to read. All of it is close to our hearts.
Books about Books
Champaca is an independent bookstore, based in Bangalore. A women-owned and run space, we carefully curate our…champaca.in
Graphic Novels
A collection of the graphic novels, memoirs, and nonfiction from our shelves.champaca.in
Feminism
Champaca is an independent bookstore, based in Bangalore. A women-owned and run space, we carefully curate our…champaca.in
Health, Mental Health, & Well-Being
Champaca is an independent bookstore, based in Bangalore. A women-owned and run space, we carefully curate our…champaca.in
Queer Stories
Here are a selection of stories about sexuality from our collection of memoirs, nonfiction, and fiction. With Infinity…champaca.in
To be a good bookseller, you have to be a good reader, and we want to bring that joy of reading to other people! The interactions I’ve loved best, and the books we’ve heard the most glowing reviews about, tend to be the ones we’ve handpicked and recommended for our customers.
Books — all kinds of books — can teach us so much, to imagine different worlds and view our own through new perspectives. We’ve each come to the store with that kind of thinking through the books we’ve read, and it’s a give-and-take relationship with our community as we learn and grow through our interactions with each other and with books!
Q4) What’s your bookselling philosophy? Connecting people with books and authors. And connecting books with community. Do you have any favourite memories or stories about connecting books with customers?
Meet the Booksellers
Get to know us, and the books we love! Find all of our recommendations here, or explore our individual faves in the…champaca.in
Nirica : What is important to us is building authentic connections with our community, and bringing a really strong personal touch to our interactions with them. Even in our online store and on our social media, we focus a lot on writing and recommending books that we think deserve to be read. In our physical store, we have little notes on books that we love, and we encourage +our community to write those for their favourite books as well!
One memory that sticks out to me is quite small, but I found it quite moving. I was asking a colleague to recommend a book to me from a genre I was quite new to. At the same time, a customer was browsing the shelves, and on hearing my question, he pulled out a book from the translations shelf — Her Story, Our Story and On The Swing by Vibhavari Shirurkar — and said that he’d never heard of it before discovering it on our shelves some months ago, and that it was one of the most brilliant books he’d ever read. I found this so heartening, and I treasure moments like that.
We’ve also held many events in the year we’ve been open, and now we’ve held quite a few online events as well. Those moments where the community has come together, whether physically or in a digital space, are also wonderful — that interaction with authors and the community, and seeing them interact with each other.
Q5) If you could expand your space infinitely, what would you add?
Nirica : We are currently in quite a small space, which allows us to curate our collection tightly and ensure that we hold a small, but diverse range of books. In an ideal world with infinite space, we’d expand on some sections, and bring in some new ones — maybe a whole shelf for humour!
We’d also love to expand our children’s library, which is a small corner of our store, into a much larger community space. We do hope to do this in the future, to make it accessible and free to kids, and host more free children’s events, like book readings and workshops.
Q6) Bookstores are cultural platforms in any society and community. They act as a home away from home or an escape from reality to bibliophiles, there is obviously some sense of belongingness. It is somewhat of a sacred place to people, especially to readers. Do you agree with this?
Nirica : We definitely agree. We have tried our best to create a warm, safe, and inclusive space for book-lovers, and for people who may be exploring books or new genres for the first time. We’ve been really thrilled, in the past year, to see our community grow along with us. Currently, with Covid-19, our reality is very different — we have limited entry into our physical space to keep our staff and community safe, and we have all our books available online — but we hope that we still bring that sense of belonging ness through our interactions with the community on social media, and on our website!
Q7) How important do you think libraries are today? Do they matter?
Nirica : Libraries are vital! Reading itself is vital — and for everyone. Books don’t have to moralize or teach, but through reading, we learn to look at the world differently, to empathize, and to think in new ways. The joy of reading is something that libraries bring to people everywhere. The role of a library, especially for kids, is unimaginably important in this regard. Two members of our team have a background in library work, and it’s definitely close to our heart.
That is our thinking with our children’s library, which is currently running at a reasonable price and with a small, but highly curated selection of books. Our library, like our bookstore, contains diverse stories from around the world, and focusing on themes we think are important or interesting, like difference and disability, identity and acceptance. (And dinosaurs!)
We do currently run a free program at a school in Pottery Town, where we read with nine- and ten-year-old children, plan activities around the books, and try to open up the joy of reading to them. In the future, we would love to be able to do this for more children, and to expand our children’s library into a larger, community space.
Q8) Do you have favourite books and authors, or a genre that you’d like to share? What are your favourite books to consistently recommend to customers?
Team Champaca's Recommendations
In June, our birthday month, we put together a little post to introduce ourselves to you, and to recommend our…champaca.in
July Recommendations - Race & Immigration
Across the world right now, questions of freedom, citizenship, and human rights are reverberating. Race and racism are…champaca.in
Nirica : Each of us has a few titles that we turn to automatically when customers ask for recommendations! One of our collective favourites is Exhalation by Ted Chiang, a collection of science-fiction short stories. Each story is inventive and thought-provoking, as well as highly empathetic and moving, and we’re big fans!
We also really like to support independent artists and publishers. Hidden Kingdom, illustrated by Nirupa Rao and written by Suniti Rao is a gorgeous book about the plants of the Western Ghats. Still Life -mirrors and windows- by Mario Santanilla, published by Bangalore-based indie publisher Reliable Copy, is a sort of stream-of-consciousness essay combining fact, personal anecdotes, and art in a beautiful book.
Q9) Any challenges or surprises you’ve encountered in your years of experience in bookselling?
Nirica : By far, the most challenging thing has been — as it has for everyone — Covid-19. And in our first year of being open! It’s been a challenge, but we’re working hard to rise up and adapt to the change. We’ve been encouraged by the support shown to us by our community, who really rose up and supported us during the difficult months of March and April, and who continue to support us now.
Of course, with big retailers online, we are up against fierce competition. But building a supportive community, and bringing a creative, thoughtful experience around stories, conversations and books, is our primary aim.
Q10) We all have aspects of the old normal that we miss. For me, it’s bookstores. Has Covid-19 changed the calculus? How are you guys currently tackling the new normal? Tell our readers here about the new subscription services or plans you have launched for the readers.
The Champaca Book Subscription
Introducing our first subscription plan: a parcel of carefully curated, specially chosen books in the mail every month…champaca.in
Nirica : Initially, we never expected to be anything but a physical space. After a year of being open, we launched an online store — now all of our books are available for purchase across India, and we ship across India. We are also experimenting with online events — we’ve held events with historian Manu Pillai, journalist Rohini Mohan, the Kenyan debut author Wanjiru Koinange, and internationally acclaimed author Roxane Gay!
We also have recently launched, and are very excited about, the Champaca Book Subscription. The idea is people can sign up for three, six, or twelve months, and will receive a curated parcel of books every month, consisting of one main book and most months a companion book as well. This year, our theme is translations, and we’ve picked books across languages and genres. It’s a way for us all to explore worlds we don’t have access to usually, and that we can now read in translation. Some plans also give access to an exciting book club discussion we hold every month.
Our physical space is highly affected by Covid-19, and we are doing our best to keep ourselves and our community safe. We don’t anticipate being able to hold in-store events for quite some time, and we’re trying to innovate to reach our audiences in new ways. It’s definitely a new mode of existence for us all!
“This is the How Champaca Are Reinventing Themselves. This lockdown situation was likewise the ideal time for Champaca to start their book subscription business model. Through this sustainable model , carefully curated books with love which are fascinating to a range of readers and bibliophiles , are delivered to subscribers every month, consequently combining bookselling with personal touch while keeping social distancing in mind.”
Radhika and the entire team at the bookstore select books that speak of diverse experiences, places and perspectives from around India and the world.
Q11) What sort of activities/workshops and discussion does Champaca conduct with respect to online or offline events in collaboration with authors and book launches? Tell our readers here about any memorable event or workshop or any interview which happened at Champaca.
Events
On Saturday, 8 August, 20 20 at 7.00 pm IST, Gitanjali Kolanad will speak to Champaca Bookstore about her new novel…champaca.in
Nirica : We’ve already hosted quite a few events since opening, mostly free. We host a series of homegrown conversations on texts that are relevant to our present time titled “Books for Now”, which has discussed, in the past, Hannah Arendt’s The Origins of Totalitarianism and Siddalingaiah’s A Word With You, World. We’ve also hosted events that work on building a local community in Bangalore, through discussions around books like Meera Iyer’s Discovering Bengaluru and Bangalore authors and poets like Poornima Laxmeswar and Jahnavi Barua. We have also featured independent collectives — local publishers like Reliable Copy and Kokaachi, zine makers, artists, and film collectives like Faraway Originals and Ghost Animation. We have supported local literary weekends, and we take our pop-up bookstore to cultural events in the city.
Online, we’ve held workshops for adults and children, focused on books — like learning how to draw your own cartoon character, or deep-diving into a book like Orwell’s Animal Farm. We’ve hosted events with Manu Pillai, Rohini Mohan, and Roxane Gay; we will soon be hosting the launch of Gitanjali Kolanad’s Girl Made of Gold on Aug 8th and Nisha Susan’s The Women Who Forgot To Invent Facebook and Other Stories on Aug 20th (more details on our website soon!). With our online events, we are excited to be able to access authors across the world, and have them be accessed from across the world!
Q12) Coffee and books go so well together. So, having a café makes total sense. Has the café acted as a catalyst in maintaining the overall business?
Nirica : The café is very much part of what makes our space, and the idea is that you can come to Champaca for the whole experience — browse our books, look out at the green avocado tree, and enjoy a cup of coffee.
Of course, we’ll have to see what this looks like in the Covid future, and when we can safely be open for that kind of interaction again!
Q13) Any trends or predictions for the bookselling industry? Are there any plans for Champaca’s future that you would like to share with our readers here?
Nirica : Independent bookstores everywhere are having to be incredibly innovative in this time. We’re excited to see where that goes, and we hope it’ll result in an increased conversation about what it means to be an independent bookstore: the challenges it takes to run a bookstore, the ways in which having a variety of bookstores can enrich our communities.
As for us, we started Champaca wanting to be a community space around books and reading, and we’re still working on that, and still growing!
In a culture of instant gratification and quick access to information or content , what Champaca ensures is that they give readers and bibliophile is the joy of discovery.
On their shelves, readers can find books from caste narratives in rural India to dystopian futures where people can move the earth; moving personal memoirs on mental health to poetry bound in sari cloth; and translations from over twenty languages, from India and internationally.
Thank you all for reading and a big thanks to Radhika and team members of Champaca Bookstore , Library & Cafe for collaborating in today’s post!
It’s a pleasure!
If any of my readers here , wish to know more about the bookstore and their work. Do open the links mentioned below . They have a wonderful informative , articulated and well-curated website. It has all the essential details about the upcoming author events as well as their latest books subscription offerings!
Website : https://champaca.in/
Instagram Page : https://www.instagram.com/champacabooks/
Facebook Page : https://www.facebook.com/champacabooks/
Twitter Handle : https://twitter.com/ChampacaBooks/
Youtube Channel : https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCDnpHCOQP6FW-_gtc6iSStw/featured