I enjoyed visiting this bookstore when last in LA – maybe i’ll do the sleepover next time i visit.
The LA Times
It was 1 a.m. and I was lying on an air mattress at the Last Bookstore in downtown L.A., listening to the muffled sounds of Pitbull playing from a bar inside the building and trying to ignore the enticing smell of “danger dogs” wafting through an open window.
I wasn’t sure what to expect when I signed up for one of the first ever sleepovers at California’s largest new and used bookstore. I had vague hopes of staying up until sunrise, reading and exchanging slumber party-esque gossip with strangers, all while surrounded by the highly-Instagrammed book tunnel and book sculptures that fill the former bank building.
The shop’s unmistakable decor and dedicated fans are part of why Josh Spencer, who created the bookstore in 2005 and later moved it to its current 22,000-square-foot-space on the corner of Spring and 5th streets, decided to host sleepovers there during the first half of April.
After spending a night with his family last year sleeping near the dinosaurs at the Field Museum in Chicago, Spencer realized that he could make some book lovers’ dreams come true.
“People are always mentioning wanting to sleep in the bookstore,” he recalled thinking. “Maybe we should try this there.”
To test it out, he launched “spring break sleepovers” as a 21-and-over experience. A standard spot was priced at $195 per person, but the most popular spots in the store, including the book tunnel, the horror vault, the classics vault and “the portal,” were $500 for two people.
“We started a little high this time just to see what the interest was basically,” Spencer said. “We’re definitely gonna have some lower price points, maybe for the family ones to try to get more kids or bigger groups.”
Over the course of two weeks, Spencer said that about two dozen people signed up. The night I slept over, nine people stayed at the bookstore: one couple in the horror vault; two friends in the tunnel; another couple in the comic book section; my partner, Reanna Cruz, and I; and Richard Powell, the store’s loss prevention manager and maintenance manager.
Read more at
