Cellar Stories
111 Mathewson Street
Providence, RI 02903
2nd Floor
111 Mathewson Street
Providence, RI 02903
2nd Floor
by Laura (lonewolfinprovidence)
Here is an account of my visit on March 20, 2009 to Cellar Stories, my favorite used/ rare book outlet in Providence, Rhode Island. My errand was to record and describe the bookstore’s information architecture as a project for Eugene Santos’s course CGRA3040 at Johnson & Wales University.
On reaching the top of the stairs and walking through the inner door, one turns 90 degrees right to face the main part of the bookstore; the back wall is the west side of the room. The cashier’s counter is to the immediate left; in front of the counter is a table piled with books in cardboard boxes, the bargain picks. To the right of the table, separated from it by a space, are display racks of postcards.
The main stacks are arranged perpendicular to the cashier’s counter. From the left (south) side of the room, including a row along the left-hand or south wall, three stacks run the length of the room. Moving to the right, one finds four more short rows of stacks before coming to the right wall, which runs the length of the room on the right (north) side. To the front, or east part of the short rows of stacks, a section resembling an enclosure like a courtyard has books arranged on the outside perimeter as well as on the inside; this is the children’s section, with a table and chairs inside the enclosure.
The main organizational scheme of the store is by genre, subdivided first by subgenre and then within subgenres, by author. Some sections, particularly some divisions of the massive pulp-fiction collection, are further subdivided by paperback and hardcover copies. The labeling system is primarily achieved through hand-written paper notes—most of them blue or white written on with a black marker—posted on the shelves or ends of stacks. A full spatial description of the arrangement of main stack sections appears in an appendix at the end of this posting.
Navigation can be performed in several ways, provided a patron has in mind a particular book to find (an example of task completion). First, if a patron can use the handwritten labels to note that the store is arranged by genre and subgenre and also figure out the alphabetical arrangement by author within the subgenre, then the patron can go directly to the stacks and see whether the book he is looking for is there. Of course the success of this method would depend on the patron’s being able to recognize bookstore proprietors’ conceptual models of “genre,” “subgenre” and “author” as organizational concepts, and then within author categories, the patron would have to understand alphabetization in English.
Another form of navigation may be used if a patron has in mind a particular book, and that is to ask the employee at the counter. I had the pleasure of encountering the store’s proprietor, Michael K. Chandley, who graciously answered my questions though they might not have been the usual kind asked of him by his patrons. Incidentally, when I asked whether the arrangement of the store followed any kind of trade standard, he replied that it did not, but that it just evolved.
As a test case I asked for four books: Information Architecture by Lou Rosenfeld and Peter Morville, The Elements of User Experience: User-Centered Design for the Web by Jesse James Garrett, The Design of Everyday Things by Donald Norman (under both its old and new titles), and Don't Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability by Steve Krug. Mr. Chandley looked in his computer, which apparently contains a database of his holdings. The feedback was quick; not one of the titles appeared to be in the store. Nevertheless, Mr. Chandley recommended that I take a look at the shelves in the section on design, in the small room behind the cashier’s counter, at the back of the far left wall. The feedback was repeated; none of the titles was available.
One other way of finding a book at Cellar Stories is to consult the store’s web site, though Mr. Chandley points out that only the volumes priced at $15 or higher are generally listed on it.
Some constraints and affordances may be suggested here, though they are not foolproof. On the one hand, when a book is catalogued and shelved properly, a look in the stacks and in the computer’s database ought to be a reliable way of finding out whether the book is in the store; there are not too many ways to go astray. But considering that patrons may handle the books and put them back on the shelves after looking at them, the system is only as reliable as a prior patron’s goodwill or competence in shelving the item correctly, or the capability of the staff to clean up behind the patrons. Any error in shelving could lead to a book’s being considered not in stock though it may be. I did not stick around long enough to find any such examples. Rather, though I'd told myself I would not buy anything on that trip, I couldn't resist a copy of a collection of essays about Ludwig Wittgenstein's Philosophical Inquiries at $1.25, and I got out while the damage was small.
Appendix: Floor Layout/ Stacks of Cellar Stories
The stack on the left (south) wall that runs the length of the room is comprised mainly of the section on History; it is subdivided into subgenres, arranged from front (east) to back (west) of the store as follows: U. S. History, arranged by individual states and also by presidents, Canada History, Classical Greek/ Roman, European, Area History, Military History, with Political Science in the stacks at the back wall.
The second stack, which runs the length of the store’s main room, has on the left or south-facing stack: Biography, Hunting/ Fishing, Sports, Transportation, Economics, Business, Law, and Espionage. The same stack, on the right or north-facing side, contains books on the Occult, Religion, Philosophy, and Science. The front (east) end cap of this stack contains Classical Literature.
The third stack from the left or south side, also running the length of the room, contains on the left or south-facing shelves from front to back: Erotica, Self-Help, Social Sciences, Archaeology and Anthropology, Natural Sciences, Medicine, and Mathematics. The same stack, on the right or north-facing side, contains books on Movies and Film, Music, Drama, Media Studies, and Gay-Lesbian Studies. An end cap at the front or east end of the stack contains Graphic Novels.
To the right of this stack, two short stacks make up a long row running the length of the main part of the room. The front stack contains on its left or south side the books on Literary Criticism, and on its right or north side Literature, A-L by authors’ last names. On its back or west end, an end cap contains collections of essays.
A short stack to the back (west) of this one holds on its left or south side: Literature Anthologies, Poetry, Letters and Diaries, and Literary Biography. The right or north side of this stack holds African-American Fiction and Gay-Lesbian Literature. At the front or east side, an endcap contains a collection of Thomas DeQuincey’s works, Beat Literature, and Drug/ 1960’s Literature. At the west or back end, an end cap holds oversize Shakespeare and Lawrence volumes.
A short stack to the right or north of this one contains on both sides volumes of literary fiction arranged by author.
To the right or north of this stack, another short stack contains on its left or south side a section of True Crime fiction followed by Westerns and Romance, with hard cover and paperback volumes mixed. The right or north side of this stack contains, from front (west) to back (east), Mysteries and Thrillers in hardcover volumes arranged by author.
To the right of this stack, the last short stack before the right or north wall contains on its left or south side, from front (east) to back (west) Thriller paperbacks and Mystery paperbacks. It may be noted that in the sections subdivided by hardcover and paperback, some hardcover volumes are mixed with paperbacks. The right or north side of this stack contains Science Fiction.
The right or north wall extends the almost the length of the room and appears to be entirely Science Fiction, Fantasy Annuals, and Horror Fiction, with some shelves at the front or east end of the room devoted to entire author collections; for example, H. P. Lovecraft. Just in front (or to the east) of this long stack, two narrow stacks contain “New Fiction” and “New Arrivals.”
At the back (west) wall of the room, from left to right, the genre subdivisions are: Political Science, Dictionaries and Reference, Technical, Cliff Notes, and Foreign Languages (including subsections of French, Latin, German, Italian, Arabic, and Spanish).
The square section of Children’s Literature to the front of the three northernmost rows of short stacks is arranged with children’s fiction around the inside perimeter, around the table and chairs; many volumes of Harry Potter stories are found here. On the outside perimeter, the left or south side contains series collections and children’s nonfiction; the back or west side contains video game manuals and a genre described as “Anti-Optimism Literature,” including titles published by Rue Morgue Press; the right or north side has comic books and Humor.
At the front of the store, in a separate smaller room behind the cashier’s counter, are sections on Art, Crafts, Travel, Collectibles, Cookbooks, Gardening, Nautical, Architecture, and Design. At the doorway to this room, on shelves above the door, are Loeb Classics, those green and red books containing the original Greek and Latin with English translations on facing pages.
Some arrangements of small units of shelves seem to be randomly arranged. For instance, one of the short stacks containing literary fiction has a narrow stack at its end full of French Literature, which may be an overflow from the stacks of foreign language volumes at the back wall. And while a narrow stack of books on linguistics is placed on the left end of a back-wall section on foreign languages, there is another whole section just for the works of Noam Chomsky at the back (west) end cap of the section on Military History.
In addition to end caps that seem to have overflow containment (rather than marketing strategy) as their main purpose, many small bookcases, carts and milk crates contain apparently randomly placed overflow materials. For instance, near the literature anthologies and poetry books, one short bookcase contains books on Dance. On a bridge over two sets of stacks, some apparently rare books titled Satirical Augustan Verse (5 vols. $200) and Poems on the Affairs of State (7 vols., $400) would be well out of the reach of any casual shoplifter. In a milk crate on the floor next to the poetry section, an apparently random stack of magazines contains a Boston After Dark Arts & Entertainment tabloid and an issue of Rolling Stone with an article about Madonna and an interview with Carrie Fisher. These items are just a few highlights; to describe all of the small units in the store would be a lengthy and detailed task, never mind the time it would take to read the result.
