{"id":41692,"date":"2025-11-11T00:06:08","date_gmt":"2025-11-11T00:06:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/41692\/"},"modified":"2025-11-11T00:06:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-11T00:06:08","slug":"this-charming-old-bookstore-in-south-florida-holds-50000-books-collected-over-40-years-and-even-has-an-adorable-shop-cat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/41692\/","title":{"rendered":"This Charming Old Bookstore In South Florida Holds 50,000 Books Collected Over 40 Years \u2014 And Even Has An Adorable Shop Cat"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/oldfloridabookshop-1024x683.jpg\" class=\"img-fluid\" alt=\"large antique book opened on a deck, with shelves full of books in the background\" width=\"1024\" height=\"683\"\/><br \/>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tPublished with permission from the Old Florida Book Shop. <\/p>\n<p>    Save<\/p>\n<p>Step inside the Old Florida Book Shop and you\u2019ll be greeted by walls of filled-to-the-brim bookshelves (complete with rolling ladders), antique artwork and maps, and glowing Tiffany table lamps. Oh, and Peter the cat! Because every bookstore needs a shop cat.<\/p>\n<p>Started by book and history enthusiast William Chrisant, the shop boasts over 50,000 items. It\u2019s mostly books, of course, spanning categories from art to natural history to poetry to fashion and textiles, but there\u2019s also antique furniture and other one-of-a-kind goods. The store has been a staple in Dania Beach since 2009, but existed in many different iterations before then.<\/p>\n<p> A rich history <\/p>\n<p>Chrisant officially started the shop in 1978 in Akron, Ohio. Inspired by famous booksellers Otto Harrssowitz and B. H. Blackwell, Chrisant decided to purchase and collect all the books he was reading for graduate school. Pretty soon, he had a large enough collection to open a book shop, which he did in a local Ohio antique store. He later expanded to an old Ohio schoolhouse, then to a space in Cleveland, and even opened an additional spot in Shaker Square.<\/p>\n<p>In 2009 Chrisant made his way down to Florida, and brought his storied book shop from Ohio to Fort Lauderdale where he now runs it with his family.<\/p>\n<p>Chrisant is an active member of the book community here, serving as a member of the HistoryMiami Museum, the Florida Bibliophile Society, the Antiquarian Booksellers\u2019 of America, and more.<\/p>\n<p>The Old Florida Book Shop is definitely a collector\u2019s paradise, and you\u2019ll see more high-end tomes for sale <a href=\"https:\/\/www.oldfloridabookshop.com\/page\/buyabook\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"shortcode-outbound-link\" data-has-ga=\"true\" data-ga-type=\"click\" data-label=\"https:\/\/www.oldfloridabookshop.com\/page\/buyabook\" data-action=\"text_cta_0\" data-category=\"click_non_sales\">on their website<\/a>. In person though you\u2019ll find more accessible options. And, a fun feature the store has is shelves full of books for only $1 that live in front of the store 24\/7! You can even purchase them when the store isn\u2019t formally open and just slip your money through the slot in their door.<\/p>\n<p>    Location and hours <\/p>\n<p>\ud83d\udccd The Old Florida Book Shop is located at 3426 Griffin Road in Fort Lauderdale. It\u2019s open:<\/p>\n<p>\u23f0 Monday-Saturday 11 a.m. \u2013 6 p.m.; Sunday: 1 p.m. \u2013 6 p.m. (Call for holidays)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Published with permission from the Old Florida Book Shop. Save Step inside the Old Florida Book Shop and&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":41693,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[249,251,250,27653],"class_list":["post-41692","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fort-lauderdale","tag-fort-lauderdale","tag-fort-lauderdale-headlines","tag-fort-lauderdale-news","tag-reading-literature"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41692","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41692"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41692\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41693"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41692"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41692"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41692"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}