At the end of the month, mobile bookstore Smitten Booktique will make a stop in Leawood — in more ways than one.
For the past year, the “bookmobile” has brought romance books to readers across the Kansas City metro. At each stop, owners Kara and Damien Bowersock said it’s common for customers to ask when and where the shop will enter its brick-and-mortar era.
When the bookstore pops up at the Town Center Plaza’s “Fall Chick” event in Leawood at the end of September, this is the first time that the Bowersocks will be able to tell those Leawood customers that yes, Smitten does have a brick-and-mortar store — and it’s right nearby.
The husband-and-wife duo will open Smitten Booktique’s new brick and mortar store at the Park Place shopping center on Sept. 27.
Smitten Booktique is opening at 11531 Ash St.
- The shop has moved into a space at the Park Place shopping center, near Breakout KC and the Pink Antlers boutique.
- Children’s clothing boutique Owen & Graham previously occupied that space for roughly three years before it closed in July.
- Once it opens, Smitten Booktique’s regular hours will be 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Tuesday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. Saturday, and 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday.
Smitten will offer books and “bookish” gifts
At Smitten, it’s all about romance.
The shelves will be stocked with love stories of all kinds — “spicy, sweet and everything in between,” as Kara puts it.
In addition to adult and young adult romance novels, the store will also carry children’s books that are more focused on familial and friendly love, along with some self-love focused books as well.
“We always like to say that we cater to those who love love,” Damien said.
In addition to books, Smitten will also sell a variety of accessories and knicknacks, such as hats, bookmarks and candles.
Why romance?
In part, it’s a genre that Kara herself has always been drawn to reading. And a shop that’s focused on all things romance also tends to be a happy place, she said.
“When people come in, it’s never anything serious,” she said. “We always laugh, and we always have a good time.”
But as Damien pointed out, the number of other readers who find themselves gravitating toward romance stories has been steadily on the rise. Ultimately, he said, those stories tend to hit home.
“(The romance genre) has been hot, thanks to TikTok and Instagram and everything for really the last two and half years,” he said. “There’s literally thousands of (romance) authors, and some of those authors have hundreds of titles. There’s something so fundamental to a good relationship story, because it’s the one thing that all of us can relate to in some way.”
Smitten Booktique is not new to Johnson County
Though the Leawood store is Smitten’s first standalone storefront, it’s not actually the shop’s Johnson County debut.
In 2023, Smitten got its start out of a “tiny” vendor space at the Painted Tree Boutiques, off 135th Street and Antioch Road in Overland Park.
Smitten continued to grow after that, adding on the bookmobile in 2024.
The couple said they’d been considering going brick and mortar for a while, but they knew they wanted to find the right space — one that didn’t infringe on another local bookstore’s neck of the woods.
Then earlier this year, while the Bowersocks were walking around at Park Place, the right space finally emerged.
“I turned around and saw the front of this (store), and I was like, ‘Oh my god’ — this was just exactly what I wanted,” Kara said about the new Leawood space. “As we got out and about with the mobile (bookstore), we found that quite a few of our customers were out this way.”
Without a standalone store, Kara said one part of the bookstore experience was missing — the ability to build community in their own space. With this new chapter, that’s something she said Smitten will be able to do now.
“In the mobile store, it’s so busy that we don’t have a lot of time to just sit and talk with people,” Kara said. “We’d like to have author signings and book clubs and release parties. So all of the things that bookstores typically do, we get to do them now.”
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