A Home in the Heart of Philadelphia: Molly’s Books & Records

By Lexie Kauffman

When walking down South Ninth Street in Philadelphia, so many things will engulf your senses, whether it be the smell of different cuisines cooking in their food stalls or the sounds of the city streets with vendors calling out orders and items.

Out of the corner of your eye, a metal awning and a unique mosaic storefront catch your attention. You can’t help but be drawn towards it. Under the awning sits boxes of “bargain books,” and you rifle around as you take in the small building. A hand-painted sandwich board sits alongside the curb proclaiming “Discover the Joy of Cookbooks; Browse Our Back Room 100s of titles! Out-Of-Print; Antiquarian; Food Ephemera.”

It feels inviting, like you’re arriving home. You’ve found Molly’s Book & Records, a little oasis in the Philadelphia Italian Marketplace. In the words of the owner, Molly Russakoff, the store is the “best kept secret” of the area. The store relies on the foot traffic from the Italian Marketplace, and when customers walk into her store, Russakoff wants them to feel welcome.

“It’s our home,” Russakoff said when asked about the atmosphere of her store. “We like to keep that feeling, where you’re coming into our home. [It’s] bright [and] organized. We like things to be easy to find and we like to be helpful and friendly.”

You feel drawn inside, so you open the door and step into 600 square feet of paradise. Your eyes immediately find the hand-painted section signs that hang proudly from the ceiling and the colorful tile that covers the floor. Different CD’s and records line the wall to your right with the poetry section right next to it. You’ve entered the home of Molly Russakoff and Joe Ankenbrand, a poet and a musician.

You’re immediately greeted by a member of the bookstore family. The check-out counter is directly to your left, and it’s usually staffed by Russakoff’s son, Johnny, or Russakoff and Ankenbrand themselves. They are so excited to welcome you, and you smile back. You then feel a feather-light touch to your calf and look down to find a tricolor tabby staring up at you. The store cat, Mrs. Stevenson, loves to choose a lucky customer a couple of times a day. Once you’re chosen, she will follow you for the entirety of your time in Molly’s Books & Records.

With your new shopping partner by your side, you continue into their home. Bins of records for sale sit around the front of the store. According to Russakoff, the current popularity of vinyl records creates the perfect opportunity to “put their best foot forward” and display the sought-after materials front and center. The poetry section also sits towards the front of the store. You can’t help but notice how the main features of the first space reflect the passions of the owners; this store is a piece of them.

As you move through the home, you stand before the shelves of books that amass the space, from floor to ceiling. The lighter wood – oak, maybe pine, you think – feels inviting and approachable. This is an affordable wood that makes a bookshelf that doesn’t judge its customers. It’s not fancy; it’s simple, like it’s there for everyone to enjoy. Lydia Pyne, a historian and writer, hypothesizes that bookshelves control how we interact with a space. She states, “Bookshelves serve as powerful symbols because they have a particularly powerful cultural cachet that connotes specific expectations for how we ‘ought’”’ to interact with them as objects. Bookshelves immediately cue us to how we ought to interact with a room and how much importance or power we assign it” (Pyne 49). In this moment, you agree with Pyne. Molly’s bookshelves welcome you into the store and keep the space warm and homey. There is no prejudice or hierarchy in the light wooden shelves that overflow with books.

Leaning into this feeling of at home, you dare to run your finger along the spines of the books, an action incredibly intimate that you might not be comfortable doing at a Barnes & Noble. The books are all arranged spine out, alphabetical by author’s last name. According to Russakoff, they wish they could have “face outs” – the term she uses to describe books displayed with their cover facing customers – but they just don’t have the space in their store. But you like the ambiance that’s created by the full shelves. It creates a full and happy atmosphere, but also a little bit of a hunt. These shelves full of spines invite you to stay awhile and make yourself comfortable while you browse. The inventory is updated, relevant, and organized. Russakoff claims to keep a steady inventory of classics and modern classics and you can clearly see this reflected on her shelves. For example, Russakoff says that the store must always have a copy of Margaret Atwood’s Handmaid’s Tale because there is a consistent demand for it and Molly’s always provides for their customers.

Every item in the inventory is handpicked, like you’re pulling a book from their personal shelf. If you search through their politics or religion section, you will find books that represent Russakoff and Ankenbrand’s beliefs because they choose not to stock things that they do not specialize in or enhoy. For example, there is no genre fiction in the store, just like there is none in their apartment upstairs. Russakoff will happily point customers to other bookstores in the area to find genre fiction, but they do not carry it themselves. Despite the lack of genre fiction, they still carry an extensive fiction collection, filling the entire left side of the entryway.

A comprehensive floor plan of Molly’s Books & Records, originally drawn by Molly Russakoff. Please note that this is not drawn fully to scale.

As you move through the home, you recognize three distinct areas within the small space: the entryway, the living area, and the kitchen. The “living area” is the center room: the area with smaller, specialized sections. Nonfiction, books by local authors, philosophy, religion, and art books all populate these shelves.

When you move towards the final room in the store, the kitchen if you will, you enter the heart of the home: the cookbook room. Above the narrow wooden entrance sits a white and blue hand-painted sign. Within the room, floor to ceiling wooden shelves overflow with cookbooks from endless cuisines. About seven years ago, Russakoff decided to bring her love of food and cooking into the bookstore via an extensive collection, and cookbooks surround you, filling all four walls. You can find anything from general everyday cookbooks to special edition books signed by famous chefs. This section is diverse and flexible because Molly’s Books & Records defines “food writing” broadly. The section can include “biographies and memoirs, essay collections by writers like MFK Fisher, and reference works” as long as food remains the central theme.

Books and records are not the only items that call Molly’s their home. Like many bookstores, Molly’s Books & Records also has “not-books” around the store. According to Pyne, “Putting not-books on a shelf in addition to actual books is a way of declaring one’s identity and individuality” (Pyne 25). Molly’s Books & Records has store merch, like mugs, as well as merch from The Philadelphia Bookstore Map, a project that Russakoff was a collaborator on. Additionally, Russakoff recycles old, illustrated children’s books by making them into notecards. She’s been making these cards for the past couple of years and the community loves the handmade and sustainable aspect of them. Pyne establishes that “not-books” declare one’s identity and Molly’s truly embodies that idea. The handmade nature of their not-books and the homey-feel of the mugs all point towards the larger theme of Molly’s Books & Records: home.

Whether it be the welcoming staff, the bright lights, the handmade signs, or the easy-to-understand organization, this place feels like home. You smile to yourself and reach down to pet Mrs. Stevenson again as you take in the warmth and love that radiates from the shelves around you.