Storyboard, the bookshop-café a stone's throw from the Puces de Saint-Ouen

It's one of the newest spots on Rue des Rosiers, known throughout Paris for its flea market, the must-see event in Saint-Ouen. With its discreet window display, you'd be hard pressed to miss Storyboard, the bookshop where you sometimes come for a coffee, to find an original gift idea with the advice of Bess, who runs the store, or to sample its incredible home-made pastries.

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Behind this bookshop in Auvergne are Bess andJulien: together for years, they moved to Saint-Ouen in 2016. "It's a town that's close to our hearts", says Julien, especially as at the time there was only one general bookshop in the town. So, together with Bess, they threw themselves wholeheartedly into the project: under consideration since 2019, they finally opened the bookshop in October 2021. Bess designed some of the bespoke furniture (the café tables, the bar, the checkout cabinet...) to create the place of her dreams. All day long, she's the one you meet in the store, to advise you on the books on the shelves, serve you a hot specialty coffee or one of her excellent chocolate chip cookies. She used to regret not having found "her café" in Saint-Ouen, but now she's opened her own, a dream she's had all her life.

Not only is Storyboard a general bookshop, it also features a small concept store with products that Bess handpicks: literary candles, colorful stationery... The shop also features designs (postcards, posters, etc.) by Camille Priol, an Audon-based artist with a graphic style that blends fine lines and pastel shades. Upstairs, you'll find the comics section, which includes manga, modern comics, graphic novels, picture books...which have given the bookshop its name: Storyboard. On the first floor, the bookshop's more general department greets you as you enter, followed by the huge children's department, opposite thecoffeeshop area. In the basement, Julien has set up a post-production studio with a film editing table: the space isn't yet ready to open to the public, but it won't be long, at least not for educational purposes for local high schools or professionals in the field.

A la carte, Storyboard serves specialty coffees (roasted in Paris) along with the coffeeshop classics: lattes, cappuccino, americano, espresso, chocolates, teas,cow's milk or vegetarian (€0.50 supplement). Count on €2 to €4.25 per hot drink, with the option of eating in or taking away. As for cold drinks, in summer, we offer you our iced coffee: the rest of the year, we offer you sodas from Uma, a company based in Pantin that makes naturally sweetened sodas or anti-gaspi fruit juices (from €2.5 to €3.5). For those with a sweet tooth, don't miss Bess's homemade cakes: the timeless chocolate chip cookies, the banana bread with chocolate chips and dulce de leche heart, or the cinnamon cake (coffecake in American, since Bess is originally from the US), an intergenerational family recipe, which she inherited from her mother and grandmother.

Here, the emphasis is not only on homemade products, but also on local produce: the two creators of Storyboard have made a point of relying on local professionals. For example, an illustrator from Audon designed the site's bookmark, which is distributed to customers. From time to time, signing sessions with authors take place in the bookshop: Storyboard is both a place to live (for a short or longer visit) and a convivial place where you feel good, where you're warmly welcomed and where it's so pleasant to come and discover new releases, relax over a coffee or read a book. An address not to be missed in Saint-Ouen!