A New Black-Owned Bookshop Brings Literary Diversity to Brooklyn

Black-owned bookstores have a rich tradition of being a place for knowledge, community, and resistance. As a result, many of them, in cities nationwide, were targeted by the FBI in the 1960s and 70s as it worked to infiltrate and destroy the Black Power Movement. Still, over the years, these pillars of Black communities have remained vital hubs of Black knowledge and power. According to Publishers Weekly, in 1999, there were 325 Black-owned bookstores in the U.S. That number decreased over the years, with there only being 54 in 2014, but now that number has seen an uptick. According to the African American Literature Book Club, there are approximately 108 Black-owned bookstores in the U.S. today, and including the recent opening of 34-year-old New York native, Darlene Okpo’s Brooklyn-based store, Adanne, that number is up to about 109.

In May of this year, Darlene — who previously created the successful clothing brand, William Okpo (named after her father) with her sister, Lizzy — opened Adanne in the DUMBO neighborhood of Brooklyn. The daughter of Nigerian immigrants, she chose the Igbo word meaning “she is her mother’s daughter” as the name for her store as a nod to her mother, Pauline, whose nickname is Adanne. Her store celebrates African American culture through its rich inventory of apothecary, tote bags, t-shirts, accessories, and of course, books.

“I was always in a library. I actually worked at a New York City Public Library in high school. That's how obsessed I was with books,” she tells Teen Vogue. She went on to major in African American history and minor in Women's Studies as a college student, and that’s where her passion for reading and learning grew. It was also when Darlene first realized the amount of Black history she didn’t learn in school. “I was upset,” she says. “My teacher said, ‘when you take on this major, you're going to be really upset, but you're going to leave here with a different mindset and you're going to want to change the world.’”

That uncovering of truth is what inspired Darlene, also a ninth-grade teacher, to open Adanne. “That's where the bookstore came about. Just years of me just wanting it, but also for my students and adults who want to regain their knowledge of African American history,” she says. “So this bookstore is not just a bookstore, it's for the community.”

For Darlene, stores like her own provide resources beyond the books they carry. “Whether it was the public library or one of my favorite bookstores (Source of Knowledge in Newark and Sister’s Uptown in Harlem), every time I go, I never want to leave,” she shares. Regardless of whether or not she buys a book, “I know I'm going to gain confidence and knowledge from the bookstore owners. Just having people come in here and have that conversation with them, being able to see what books they pick out, and build upon what it is that they seek — it's just amazing. So for me, I feel like this isn’t even for me. I created this for other people as a community hub.”

Following in the tradition of being a Black-owned bookstore that fosters conversation and growth, Okpo is having a Juneteenth celebration this Saturday, June 19 from 12pm to 4pm. With Juneteenth being a holiday that commemorates when the last enslaved African Americans were told they were free, months after they should have been freed, paired with the recent national attention the holiday has currently received — this delayed liberation and spotlight on the history not being taught, is in line with Okpo’s mission. “I didn't know about Juneteenth until I got to college,” Darlene says. “For me, Juneteenth is a celebration of knowledge. A celebration of history. A celebration of where we're going.” The event will feature a conversation among four Black creatives. “It's [the event] a free resource to be able to sit amongst these people and have them tell you their process, how they started, and where they're going.”

In hosting her Juneteenth celebration, she’s reiterating her belief that the valuable content in Adanne and other Black-owned bookstores extends beyond the shelves. “Walking into a Black-owned bookstore, for me, it’s heaven,” Darlene says. “Because it's all of this knowledge that has been hidden to me for years. Now, it's finally here for me to engage and use as a resource.”

Originally Appeared on Teen Vogue