Penn Book Center, the 58-year-old indie book store at 34th and Sansom that was saved from imminent closure last summer, recently got a new name from its new owners. Since December, it’s been called People’s Books & Culture, and also has a new logo (see photo).

The new name was chosen from a public poll and has the same initials as the previous name (PBC), which was very important to the new owners.

“We had all kinds of interesting answers, but keeping the PBC initials was central to the store’s branding and community name recognition,” Duquès told Billy Penn. 

After the news broke last spring that the store was going out of business, the previous owners, Ashley Montague and husband Michael Row, issued a plea to the community help them work out a new business plan to keep the store open. Thanks to the support from the community and a campaign to save the store launched by Penn faculty and students, the University of Pennsylvania extended their lease through the end of last summer. In August 2019, it was announced that the store had new owners – Matt Duquès and Diana Bellonby, both scholars, who were moving to Philadelphia from Alabama.

Apart from getting the new name, the store is also undergoing some renovation and an upgrade, like installation of new tile flooring and area rugs and addition of a new classroom and reading space upstairs, according to Billy Penn.

Despite all the upcoming changes, the store is still hosting book reading events almost every day. Here’s the schedule for the rest of this month and the first week of February:

• “Paradigm Lost” w/ Ian Lustick: 01/29/2020 – 5:30pm to 7:00pm
• “Information Hunters” w/ Kathy Peiss (NEW TIME 6PM): 01/30/2020 – 6:00pm to 7:30pm
• “The Observer Effect” w/ Barry Schwabsky: 01/31/2020 – 6:30pm to 8:00pm
• Poetry Reading ft Porsha Olayiwola & Adam Falkner: 02/04/2020 – 6:30pm to 7:30pm
• “When Novels Were Books” w/ Jordan Alexander Stein: 02/06/2020 – 6:00pm to 7:30pm

For more information, visit the PBC website (the new website is also coming soon!).