With Valentine’s Day around the corner, you may be looking for a unique idea for a date. If you and your partner love to read books, there are several great bookshops for dates in Nairobi.
Exploring bookstores can be a budget-friendly adventure. If you both love to read, strolling through shelves packed with fresh-smelling paperbacks may be a great date idea for you.
However, some bookstores in Nairobi offer an extra experience.
1. Cheche Books
This is a twofer. It comes as a café and a bookstore. Cheche is located at Karuna Close, Nairobi.
It is an ambient, warm location where you can explore books and have a meal afterwards. It also contains a large inventory of pan-African books.
Furthermore, the bookstore frequently hosts literary events. In January 2023, they held talks about solidarity between African Americans and Black people in the diaspora.
For many literati, this bookstore café can be the perfect date full of stories, food, and the occasional informative seminar. The best concert for bookish introverts.
2. Text Book Centre, Flagship
This is the main branch of the country’s most abundant bookstore, Text Book Centre. It’s located at the Sarit Centre mall, in Westlands, Nairobi.
Text Book Centre branches typically offer only aisles of fiction, nonfiction, and textbooks. However, the flagship store has a sprawling and comfortable sitting area where readers can explore and sample the books they want to buy. It’s a perfect space for a book club meeting for two. The flagship store also has more shelves than most bookstores, giving book lovers more to explore.
The store is also in one of the biggest malls in the city, which contains multiple bars and restaurants.
3. Soma Nami Bookshop
This is a woman-owned bookstore located at the Greenhouse Mall on Ngong Rd, Nairobi. The two-storey shop is packed with plenty of book genres.
It is also one of the best bookshops for dates because it has one of the largest collections of Kenyan literature.
Furthermore, Soma Nami has one of the fastest-growing public book clubs in the county. They meet at the store every month to discuss the book of the month.
In addition, the store also has a pleasant Afrocentric ambience and sitting areas for people who want to sit down and talk about books. The store also provides beverages and snacks for guests.
It has one of the most beautiful reading spaces in the city, pockmarked with portraits of African literary heroes.
Apart from sitting and talking about books, other fun things you can do on a bookstore date include:
- Doing scavenger hunts in bookstores and libraries. You can set up a few games, such as finding a title whose author has your partner’s initials. Or try to locate a bestseller published in the year you were born.
- You can exchange a wish list, and the first person to find the respective book gets their book purchased.
Bookstores can be a lot more fun than just shopping for books.
Check out
Nairobi: 10 Interesting Date Ideas Below 3000 Kenya Shillings
10 Places To Take A Girl On A First Date In Nairobi
Books and Coffee: 5 Coffee Shops Every Reader Should Try and Visit
7 Ways To Add Fun Into Your Marriage or Dating Life.
8 Reasons Why Couples Should Travel Together.
Relationships: A Guide To Learning Your Partner’s Love Language.
