Books Kinokuniya’s flagship store in Takashimaya Shopping Centre in Orchard Road will have its size reduced, with the vacated space taken over by, among others, a new cafe.
The downsizing comes after rental negotiations with Ngee Ann City owner Toshin Development. Shoppers at Singapore’s last big bookstore on Feb 16 and 17 were met with rows of empty shelves in the front quarter of the store and staff in the flurry of a reshuffling operation.
It is unclear at the moment what percentage of the 38,000 sq ft store will be returned to the landlord, though shelves closer to the store front dedicated to local literature, Asian literature, psychology, philosophy, mystery and thriller have been entirely emptied.
The bookstore on Feb 17 remained operational. A recurring announcement informed shoppers that Books Kinokuniya was “currently making changes to store layout” and to approach staff if they are unable to find the items they are seeking.
Books Kinokuniya told ST that “challenges are ever present for book retailers”.
“Our Singapore main store continues to evolve while remaining true to our core values, offering an extensive collection of quality titles housed in a pleasant ambience,” it said in a statement.
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ST has also asked Books Kinokuniya how the change will affect its staff.
Landlord Toshin Development said Books Kinokuniya will “refine its book collection while incorporating a lifestyle element”.
The transformation will include a new cafe, an outfit separate from Books Kinokuniya that is slated to begin operations within the first half of 2025.
Toshin Development assured the public that Books Kinokuniya “remains a key anchor tenant”. In 2024, it had said that “having a bookstore in Takashimaya Shopping Centre adds dimension to the diverse range of offerings to our valued patrons”.
The size of Kinokuniya’s flagship has ebbed and flowed over the years.
It occupied a 42,000 sq ft space on level three of the mall from 1999 to 2013, before it had to cut around 25 per cent of its space and move up to the fourth floor to make way for new retail offerings in 2013.
After the exit of Chinese restaurant Imperial Treasure Teochew Cuisine in 2016, it restored 5,000 sq ft to its space and reopened with the layout and frontage familiar to shoppers today.
The latest reduction of Singapore’s largest bookstore is grim news for a severely diminished industry, which in 2024 suffered the exit of Times Bookstores at the end of nearly five decades of operations and, in January 2025, the shutting of SingLit bastion Epigram Books’ bricks-and-mortar store in Tanjong Pagar Distripark.
Hamstrung by poor reading habits and book-buying rates, bookstores here have struggled to find sympathetic landlords that could help alleviate the high rents of the city-state, booksellers say.
A National Library Board 2021 survey found that only 33 per cent of respondents reported reading six books or more a year.
The news about Books Kinokuniya’s downsizing is likely to elicit a greater emotional response from the book community and the public, who have come to love it for the quality of its book offerings and being a haven in central Singapore amid a sea of luxury brands.
Novelist and editor Daryl Qilin Yam, 33, said: “When I was 15, alone and bullied, one of the first things I did to seek some sort of solace was to go to Kinokuniya and to browse all its titles from A-Z. That was how I chanced upon Margaret Atwood as an author.
“Books will always be around, but something ineffable shrinks and shutters whenever the same happens to bookstores.” THE STRAITS TIMES
