Livraria Lello revisited

I previously wrote about Livrario Lello, the stunning bookshop in Oporto (Porto), Portugal, and that post sparked a conversation with fellow blogger Golden Brown, a resident of Portugal who had the advantage over me in that he had actually been there. As a result of our dialogue, this very kind fellow went back to Lello, this time camera in hand. All the photographs on this page are his.

For the time being, I’m a long way from being able to afford a visit myself, but I can at least allow myself the fantasy of a journey in my imagination. As a lover of coffee (as well as of books), I’d been intrigued to read somewhere that there was a tiny café above the shop. I’d imagined myself there, coffee in front of me, browsing through some book I’d just purchased – but what does this place look like? Does it even exist?

It does (click on photos to enlarge):

Small but unpretentious, by the looks of it, which is exactly what a coffee shop should be. And in the corner lurks what surely must be the prettiest cash register in Europe:

Our correspondent also sent this picture of the stained glass skylight above the shop:

The Latin motto, Decus in Labore, presumably means “grace in work”.

Another photo, showing once more part of that truly gorgeous staircase:

Many thanks to Golden Brown for these lovely pictures; I’ll confess to some cropping and post-processing, which I often do here.

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