Stories matter. Many stories matter. Stories have been used to dispossess and to malign, but stories can also be used to empower and to humanize.
Resources · The Home Library
The Home Library
The books that teach us how to live well. Black interiors, design and plants, cookbooks and visual fun. All curated entirely from and for the Black home.
A good coffee table book should do two things – start a conversation and look good doing it.
THESE DO BOTH. Curated across hip hop, history, art and architecture, every title here is a statement piece and a story.
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the Bookcase
curated entirely from and for the Black home.
Every book here was chosen with your space and our culture in mind. These are the books we grew up with on our parents’ and grandparents’ bookcases and will stand strong on the shelves of those to come.
Black interiors and architecture across continents and centuries, and the stories behind the homes.
Inside the studios of contemporary Black Caribbean makers and the craft they carry forward.
The legacy of the Black family home, told through the houses and the families who live in them.
How to collect and decorate with African heritage objects, and the stories each piece carries.
Classic rooms remixed with bold color, pattern and a whole lot of personality.
How to decorate with culture, travel finds and objects that mean something to you.
A practical guide to buying furniture you will keep for a lifetime.
A hands-on guide to expressing joy in living through African decor and elements.
a go-to resource for selecting the perfect greenery for your spaces and living alongside them.
the Pantry
The Recipes. Passed down and poured up.
The books that live on the counter. Black cookbooks, bar books and herbal guides for feeding your people and pouring them something good.
Recipes, art, poems and stories from across the African diaspora, gathered by Bryant Terry.
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Tropical cocktails made modern by rum expert Shannon Mustipher. Vacation in a glass.
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Marcus Samuelsson celebrates Black cooks and the dishes that shaped American food.
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Five generations of Black Appalachian cooks, their stories and the recipes they passed down.
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Bronx-born Ghetto Gastro serves up bold recipes with a side of culture and activism.
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Black Forager Alexis Nikole Nelson on finding food in the wild, plus vegan recipes to cook it.
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A short, warm read on Black food, feeding each other and the art of coming together.
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Toni Tipton-Martin brings back two centuries of African American recipes, from everyday to fancy.
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Cocktails pulled from two centuries of African American cookbooks. History you can pour.
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Located in Boston, MA
A few out-of-print titles link to Better World Books, which sells used books and donates books and funds to literacy programs while keeping books out of landfills.
Titles to Get Lost In
Words that stay with you long after the last page.
A carefully chosen selection of fiction and non-fiction for the serious reader. Black storytelling at its finest.
Kingston, 1988. One night of violence, and the survivors who choose revenge, silence or vanishing.
A burning California, a young woman, and a new faith built for survival. Butler saw it coming.
The Great Migration told through three lives: six million people and one decision to leave.
Poems on divorce, desire and Black joy. Ruin, repair and everything in between.
Essays, poems and fiction that put slavery and its legacy at the center of the American story.
What love is, what it asks of us, and why it shapes how we live. Essential reading.
When I dare to be powerful, to use my strength in the service of my vision, then it becomes less and less important whether I am afraid.
- Audre Lorde
Poet
the Stack
The Culture. Bound and beautiful.
The books you leave out on purpose. Visually stunning titles spanning hip hop, history, art and architecture.
Harmonia Rosales paints the Yoruba orishas into an African epic, told in art and story.
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Poems from the hip hop generation. Loud, sharp and full of life.
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A scrapbook of Black life in America, from clippings and ads to photos and stories, edited by Toni Morrison.
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Baltimore, the cast and the making of the show, in photos and stories.
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Black Americans painted and photographed across centuries, seen on their own terms.
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A history of hip hop jewelry, from rope chains to grills.
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A photographic history of Indigenous America, through Indigenous eyes.
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Black style and the art of dressing sharp, from the Met's Superfine show.
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Bold, graphic paintings full of color, pop culture and commentary.
Shop it on Bookshop.org ›The more you know, the more you can create. There’s no end to imagination.
