New bookshop opening in Bluffton. It’s the first bookshop in town since 2024

Bluffton’s first all-ages independent bookshop is opening right in the heart of Old Town Bluffton.

The Bluffton Bookshop will hold a grand opening this Saturday. The bookshop opened its doors for a soft opening last Thursday after months of renovations and planning, according to a Facebook post from the bookshop. It’s the only bookshop in downtown Bluffton, after children’s bookshop the Storybook Shoppe relocated to the Tanger Outlets in 2024.

Here’s what you can find at the Bluffton Bookshop:

What’s in the shop?

Bluffton Bookshop is Bluffton’s only general interest bookshop, offering books for all ages. Its owner, Allyn Oliver, dreamed of opening a bookshop, and found an opportunity in Bluffton, according to previous Island Packet reporting.

“I’ve always been a huge reader,” Oliver said at the time. “Owning a bookstore is just one of those pipe dreams.”

It’s located at 89 Bridge St. around the corner from Oyster Factory Park. It’s housed inside a renovated, 80-year-old Bluffton home. Renovators discovered a signed block from the home’s builder, Emmet McCracken, and incorporated it into a miniature room visitors can find inside.

Visitors can browse sections for books of various genres, and the shelves are colored-coded. For example, fiction books are on the green shelves, according to a Facebook post from Bluffton Bookshop. It also offers cookbooks, non-fiction, travel, and more. A separate children’s book nook can be found through a doorway.

Oliver wants the bookshop to fit in with the character and community of Bluffton, hence the name. She envisions a place where people can take their time, find potential reads and enjoy a coffee or tea. Videos of the bookshop show plenty of places to sit down and get acquainted with a book, and a self-serve coffee and tea machine.

The shop plans to host events including author talks, mahjong games and book signings, and two pop-up shops are planned for the summer. Bluffton Bookshop’s summer events are listed here in a Facebook post.

And there’s ice cream

Attached to the bookshop is the Frozen Fiddler, an icery serving ice cream, shaved ice and other treats. Iceries are a relatively new business category created in Bluffton in 2017.

Customers can order through a window on the side of the bookshop. The menu includes ice cream from Savannah-based Leopold’s Ice Cream.

Grand reveal

The bookshop will be open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. for the grand opening Saturday. During the ceremonies, it will reveal a mural by local artist Amiri Farris, according to a Facebook post from local magazine CH2 magazine. The mural faces Wharf Street, and was funded partly through a Town of Bluffton grant.

You can follow Bluffton Bookshop here, or sign up for its newsletter here.