To all the local book lovers of Marin, it is a pleasure to say that a new bookshop has found its way to the city of Fairfax.
Its name? Wayfinder Bookshop.
Wayfinder Bookshop may be new to Marin, but there’s nothing novel about the ins and outs of running a bookstore for its owners, who just so happen to be some of the Bay Area’s biggest bibliophiles. Married couple Molly Parent and Stephen Sparks own the already-established purveyor of hardcovers and paperbacks, Point Reyes Books.
Parent and her husband, Sparks, met while working at a bookshop in the city—their shared love of literature led to a relationship filled with reading and trips out to Point Reyes.
“We’d spend as much time in Point Reyes as we could, even when we were living in San Francisco,” Parent said. “And we always loved stopping by the Point Reyes Bookstore; it had this kind of ideal, magical feeling, and we had actually fantasized out loud about owning this little bookstore in town.”
When the couple heard that the previous owners of Point Reyes Books were looking to pass on their local bookshop’s legacy, they bid and came away with a whole book business in January 2017.
Now, nearly seven years later, Parent and Sparks have put all that experience and passion into their first “from-scratch” storefront with Wayfinder Bookshop, which opened its doors just Nov. 17 this year after a summer spent planning for the new space.
“Fairfax had been without a bookstore for a long time, and there’s such great food, cafes, parks…and it seemed to us like all the ingredients for a bookstore,” said Parent.
“Starting [a bookshop] from scratch is exciting because it’s a blank slate,” Parent continued. “But it’s challenging as well…it’s more build as you go, versus the experience with Point Reyes Books, where the previous owners left one night and we opened the next morning.”
Anyone who has enjoyed visiting the Point Reyes Books location will know just how exciting news it is to have a newly opened location in Fairfax. Customers can expect the same customer service as well as reading material that spans a wide array of entertaining, intriguing and topical topics. After all, the owners hand-chose the content of their shelves with special care and a wealth of experience selecting stock for bookshops.
“I think we are able to carry a really diverse selection in part due to the breadth of interest of our employees, sharing reading recommendations and just by reading broadly and diversely,” said Parent.
“I think the reason why reading is important in many ways is summed up by this idea of books as a tool for way-finding,” Parent continued. “Reading is a way to connect with people you’ll never know, times you’ll never live in, places you’ve never been, places that are real or imagined or only in histories or fantasy…no matter what you’re reading, you’re making your world bigger by reading.”
Parent and Sparks anticipate a busy holiday season ahead and a successful future selling books to the bountiful plethora of bibliophiles in and around the Bay Area.
“After the holidays, we’re planning on having a grand opening party, but the timing of opening just before the busiest shopping time of the year meant we hit the ground running,” said Parent.
Wayfinder Bookshop is located at 9 Bolinas Rd. in Fairfax. For more information or to order a book, call 415.295.7318 or visit the website at ptreyesbooks.com.
