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New York City has lost plenty of beloved bookstores over the decades, but the Strand is still blessedly standing—and it is about to celebrate a very big birthday.
The iconic independent bookstore will mark its 99th anniversary with Strand Day on Saturday, September 19. The day-long celebration will include bookish activities, storytimes and other special events planned throughout the day.
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Perhaps most enticingly, everything in its stores will be 20-percent off for the occasion. That means shoppers can save on new releases, used titles, rare books and the store’s seemingly endless supply of totes, stationery, calendars and New York City souvenirs. (Consider it an excellent opportunity to pick up the hardcover you have been eyeing.)
The bookstore has not yet revealed the full schedule of festivities, saying that more details will be announced closer to the date. Still, an all-day discount at one of the city’s most famous literary landmarks is reason enough to clear some space on the bookshelf now.
The Strand was founded in 1927 and became the sole survivor of Manhattan’s old “Book Row,” a stretch of Fourth Avenue once packed with dozens of booksellers. Its best-known location, at Broadway and East 12th Street near Union Square, is still a bibliophile’s wonderland: four floors filled with more than 2.5 million new, used and rare books. Its famously crowded shelves cover just about every subject imaginable, from architecture and art to travel, fiction and deliciously strange vintage finds.
The shop has long boasted of its “18 miles of books,” an appropriately unwieldy slogan for a place where popping in for one paperback can turn into an hour-long expedition. The outdoor discount racks are their own New York institution, while the rare book room upstairs holds collectible volumes for shoppers whose budgets extend beyond the sidewalk bargains.
Strand Day arrives one year before the store reaches the century mark, so consider this the warm-up party. The 99th-anniversary celebration will take place on September 19, 2026, with a 20-percent discount available at all Strand stores that day. Additional programming will be announced soon, so stay tuned!