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What colour comes to mind when you imagine a bookstore? What colour would you paint the walls? How likely is it that your answer would be yellow?
Okay, now imagine you’re in a bookstore with bright yellow walls. What do you choose for flooring? How likely is it that your answer would be black-and-white checkered tiles?

Now imagine this is a real place, and you’ll be in Daisy Chain Book Co. Daisy Chain makes a big visual impact. Yellow walls and checkered tiles are bold choices, and they work so well! The swatch for their particular yellow is titled “English Daisy.” Walking into their spacious High Street location in Edmonton, I’m reminded of the ever-fantastical Alice in Wonderland. This aesthetic experience is entirely intentional and contrasts the more conventional approach of other bookstores with their muted colours, narrow aisles, and ceiling-high wooden bookshelves stuffed to the brim with books.
If the store feels inviting, it’s because owner Brandi Morpurgo took these visual cues straight from cherished childhood memories. The checkerboard tiles resemble the floor of her aunt’s home, which was a place of great reprieve for Brandi when she was young. Her grandmother was a hungry reader, devouring one or two pocketbooks a day and storing them in an oversized, bright yellow tote bag. When she had gone through all the books in the bag, she’d holler at her husband to grab the big yellow bag while she rounded up the grandkids for a trip to a used bookstore in Nanaimo. There, she traded in her books and allowed each of her grandchildren to select a book for themselves.
“Yellow Bag Day was a huge deal,” Brandi says. “We’d take our carefully chosen books home and sit on the deck with our iced teas and read for the day. Yellow Bag Day always inspired a wide-eyed enthusiasm.” That used bookstore left a lasting impression on Brandi, and she hopes to impart the same feeling to the readers that visit her store.
From their beginnings as a book truck that visited communities without bookstores and set up at fairs, through to their first brick and mortar location in the High Street Centre in Edmonton, and on to a second location in Beaumont, Daisy Chain has impacted a ton of readers. New parents envision bringing their children into the store year after year and watching them move about from shelf to shelf as new categories of books appeal to them. Daisy Chain doubled down on the bold colours and created a bright green haven for kids in the back of the store.

Cultivating a thriving, vibrant reading life for each of their customers is Daisy Chain’s mission; their motto is “Creating a Community of Readers.” One advantage of operating a used and new bookstore is that they can be less dependent on the new and shiny titles. Instead, Brandi and her team of booksellers look for that perfect read for every reader, the one that will make a lasting impression, the one that will excite and inspire the reader all the way to their next read! “We don’t want to invest in your reading slump . . . we don’t just want to sell you garbage that has a pretty cover,” Brandi remarks.
Contrary to what you might think the purpose of a bookstore is, Brandi stresses that, for Daisy Chain, the people come before the books. By that she means the books on their shelves are direct reflections of conversations they’ve had with their customers, what they’re interested in or curious about. They listen to their customers’ recommendations—and many of the books on their shelves are donated by the very customers they serve. For each used book they take, they offer a discount toward the same number of used books in their store.

As a small business owner, Brandi understands the value of her customers’ dollars, and she wants to extend that awareness as far as possible. Sure, you might not find the trendiest new title from 2024 on her shelves—though they can always order it in for you! Instead, you’ll be able to secure two (maybe even three!) previously owned books that will satisfy your tastes and enrich your imagination.
For readers looking to connect outside of the pages of their latest great read, Daisy Chain has been successful at kickstarting and maintaining five separate book clubs, including one for teens. Book clubs are a fantastic way to extend the wonder you feel when you finish a book. They also host writing nights for communities of writers. For the more ambitious among us, they’re even hosting an all-night writing party (plus sleepover and breakfast) for National Novel Writing Month in November.

Their programming is so popular you’ll likely have to join a waitlist, but I encourage you to do so. Daisy Chain is a bookstore with all the positive vibes and bright, beautiful colours so foreign to the stodgy and dusty used bookstore we’re prone to fall for. They’re fulfilling their motto to create a community of readers and you’re absolutely welcome to join—you’re likely to make some friends along the way.
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Colby Clair Stolson grew up somewhere in the in-between, in a town called Ponoka. Every day he asks himself, “Who knows if the moon’s/a balloon”? And some of those balloons have been published: in Edmonton’s Glass Buffalo and Funicular Magazine, and in Canada’s (via Ottawa) Touch the Donkey and periodicities.