When Marc Jacobs opened BOOKMARC in 2010, the reaction was less about the books themselves than the question they raised: why was a fashion designer opening a bookstore? Sixteen years later, the answer is everywhere.
Miu Miu’s literary salons invite writers, artists, and readers to discuss classic texts. Clothing label Vowels houses a permanent research library inside its Soho store, while Buck Mason’s flagship sells a collection of over 1,000 vintage books alongside white T-shirts and denim. During the pandemic, model Kaia Gerber’s Instagram book club evolved to the literary platform Library Science. And just last month, Dua Lipa announced the opening of the Manifesto Library in partnership with Lisbon’s Livraria Lello—a permanent physical home for the reading community the pop star began building online through Service95.
While each of these projects exists in the physical world, their roots trace back to a much larger cultural shift that took shape during the pandemic. As millions of people searched for a slower pace, new hobbies, and connection online, #BookTok emerged as one of the internet’s fastest-growing communities, amassing more than 370 billion views and over 50 million videos. What began as readers filming emotional reactions and recaps evolved into one of publishing’s most powerful discovery engines.
Unlike traditional literary criticism, BookTok recommendations rarely come from critics or institutions. Instead, they’re driven by creators documenting what they’re reading in real time—crying over plot twists, filming annotated copies, and convincing thousands of strangers to pick up the same novel. Creators like Ayman Chaudhary, Jack Edwards, and Haley Pham have built audiences around reading itself, turning their personal taste into one of the internet’s most influential recommendation systems.
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Publishers have responded in kind. Special editions, deluxe covers, and collectible packaging have become standard for anticipated releases. Books once marketed through author tours and newspaper reviews are now launched with influencer mailers, creator campaigns, and TikTok-first strategies. Independent bookstores dedicate tables to “BookTok Favorites,” while major retailers like Barnes & Noble have created permanent BookTok sections in stores. A single viral recommendation can revive decades-old titles or turn a debut novel into an overnight bestseller.
The effect is visible on ShopMy, too. Over the last twelve months, collections featuring books grew 705% year over year, while linking specifically to Bookshop.org—a cleaner signal focused entirely on books—grew 250%. Although a handful of breakout titles like Onyx Storm and the broader romantasy boom account for much of that growth, the more interesting shift isn’t simply that people are buying more books; it’s that they’re building identities around being readers.
That shift has created an entirely new class of literary tastemakers. Over the past year, ShopMy’s top book creator generated more than $300,000 in book sales—roughly four times that of the next-highest creator. But perhaps even more telling is who else is successfully recommending books. Creators who traditionally cover food, lifestyle, finance, and home are all driving meaningful book sales alongside the categories they’re traditionally known for, suggesting that recommending books is becoming as natural for creators as recommending skincare, cookware, or furniture.
As reading has become more of a topic of public conversation, so too have debates over “performative reading”: whether books are being consumed as accessories or status symbols rather than read for pleasure. Videos dissecting bookshelf styling, reading goals, and color-coordinated libraries have become almost as common as book recommendations themselves. The question is not just what people are reading, but why they’re reading it.
But dismissing the phenomenon as merely performative overlooks something more significant. Reading has always been social. Book clubs, author talks, literary salons, and handwritten recommendations long predate social media. TikTok didn’t create the desire to share books, but it did exponentially drive the scale at which readers with shared interests could find one another.
Earlier this year, Coach announced a partnership with Penguin Random House on a collection of miniature, fully readable book charms, built around the idea that stories communicate identity and self-expression. At Dior, Jonathan Anderson transformed the Book Tote into a celebration of literature, printing the covers of classic novels across handbags and accessories.
Brands aren’t just borrowing the symbolism of books; they’re investing in the communities that have formed around reading. In April, Mango partnered with creator Lizzy Hadfield and her reading community, Buffy’s, to host a public book swap. Months earlier, Hadfield hosted a reading night spread across three floors of a Brooklyn townhouse with lighting brand Louis Poulsen. Both events centered around creating a space for readers to gather rather than trying to tie a creator into a product launch.
Across fashion and design, books have become a recurring cultural reference—not because brands suddenly want to become publishers, but because of what books have come to represent. As Coach wrote in announcing the collaboration, books offer “reflection, identity, and connection.” Those same qualities help explain why reading has become such fertile ground for brands. Books spark conversations, reveal taste, and give people something to recommend, discuss, and rally around.
It feels like that’s what BOOKMARC anticipated when it turned a bookstore into a place for conversation rather than just commerce. Today, the same idea extends far beyond publishing. Whether it’s Dua Lipa recommending authors through Service95, Kaia Gerber evolving an Instagram book club into an entire literary platform, or Miu Miu hosting salons during Milan Design Week, the common denominator isn’t books themselves; it’s the trusted curation.
In many ways, BookTok solved discovery. It gave readers an algorithmic place to recommend, debate, and obsess over books together. But as those communities have grown, a new question has emerged: where do readers gather once they leave the app? Literary salons, creator-led book swaps, reference libraries, and reading nights are beginning to fill that gap, many of them funded by brands that recognize the value of bringing readers together. After all, people aren’t just looking for something to read; they’re looking for people to read with.
Most creatives love to read, so this all makes sense, and I love it.
Books books books!