THE DIAL BOOKSHOP

WRITTEN BY TARYN ALLEN

The Dial Bookshop—named a er a literary journal from 1840—was founded by Mary Gibbons and Aaron Lippelt back in 2017. But about two years later, when the pair decided to leave the city and start a family, they turned to Heidi Zheng and Peter Hopkins. The two lifelong bookworms originally met at The Dial and even had their wedding party there, so despite their lack of business experience and both working other full-time jobs, they were the perfect couple to take the helm of this independent Michigan Avenue staple.

Zheng and Hopkins have helped The Dial community flourish, even during the pandemic. They mainly love owning a bookstore because it allows them to introduce more people to the books and writers they love that get lost in the shuffle amidst the constant buzz around new releases at an affordable price, to share their enthusiasm and delight with customers, but their work doesn’t end there. They started a book club; they dedicated a table in their shop to Chicago-based writers and indie presses, and all proceeds will go directly back to those writers and publishers without The Dial taking a cut; and they’re acutely aware—especially Zheng, as an immigrant woman of color—of their role as a retail space within the larger oppressive systems of capitalism, and they hope in the near future “to bring on board international students, students of color, first-generation college students, and other marginalized identities for part-time work at The Dial.”

When asked what brings her pride about The Dial, and why independent bookstores are important right now, Zheng responded, “More than ever, we see people gravitating toward small businesses in their vicinity—and ‘community’ as an ethos and a practice— for the tangibility, the localness of both the store and the people who run it, as a respite from the disheartening symptoms of larger-scale belonging, i.e. this settler-colonialist country, our white supremacist society, the extractive and exploitative mechanisms of capitalism. And even though bookstores necessarily exist in a society like everyone and everything else, which is to say, we are also subject to those egregious forces that govern This Contemporary American Life, we put up a good fight and people love to see it.”

She finished, “What we are most proud of The Dial is also why independent bookstores are important: we are a space for gathering and discovery more than we are a business, and we are a service more than we are a brand.”