September 18, 2026
Michaela Althouse/PhillyVoice
Page Burners, a new romance-only bookstore, opens Saturday below coffee shop Mad Cat Brewtique in Center City. Above, owner Annie LeCluyse sits in the shop.
Annie LeCluyse got the idea to open a bookstore two years ago on election night, when she opted to watch the Hallmark Channel instead of following the results.
"Because I come from the social work field, I knew we were gonna need connection, community and just a safe space over the next handful of years," LeCluyse said. "And I knew that my love of romance, for me it's escape and the community that it is, just the wide array of readers that it allows, it drew to me."
On Saturday, LeCluyse will open Philadelphia's second romance-only bookstore, Page Burners, in partnership with Mad Cat Brewtique at 2036 Sansom St. in Center City. The street level will feature a hybrid local artisan and coffee shop, and the books can be found downstairs in the basement.
It's the first storefront for Page Burners, which previously operated in pop-ups and sold its books on pink shelves at Mad Cat's old location and the Little Treat boutique. When Mad Cat decided to move to a larger space, owner Cassidy Fairey said she immediately thought of LeCluyse as a possible partner. LeCluyse instantly said yes. While there are other romance-only bookstores in Manayunk and Collingswood, New Jersey, she thought Center City could use one, too.
"(Collaboration) brings in different people, and even just having the bookshelves at the stores before ... was widening my ability to get to people," LeCluyse said. "It's nice because I don't come from the business world, and so having relationships with people that also are small business owners and figuring it out as we go, too, it's really fun. It has been nice just to bounce ideas off each other to do things together."
At Page Burners, readers can find shelves dedicated to local authors and new releases, as well as subgenres including holiday, paranormal, sports, science fiction, historical, mystery, dark romance and young adult. LeCluyse also plans to host books clubs, trivia nights and crafting gatherings to bring people together outside of just books.
Within the shelves, each novel has an orange bookmark featuring drawings of one to five flames. Five flames indicate the book has more explicit sexual content, while one flame means things are mostly left to the reader's imagination. LeCluyse said she uses the user-aggregated site romance.io to make the designation, and she hopes it will help customers find something that's at their own level of comfort with no surprises — so no one gets too shocked by the "spice" levels within the pages or gets disappointed reading a closed-door book when they expect more.
At Page Burners, readers can determine the 'spice level' of books based on bookmarks placed inside.
Mad Cat Brewtique, the coffee shop sharing space with Philly's newest romance bookstore.
Both LeCluyse and Fairey said they hope the shops will have a symbiotic relationship, so customers for one might peruse the other and vice versa. Outside, the sign has the names of both businesses so shoppers know they're in the right place. LeCluyse will also be adding signs inside the store to direct people downstairs, and Page Burners has a shelf right at the top of the stairs leading to the shop.
"I think that there is always going to be a trend of smaller businesses partnering together under one brick-and-mortar. It helps drive business to both of you, it helps with cost so it makes sense," Fairey said. "But I definitely think that each one is unique in its own different way."
The store will be open Tuesdays and Wednesdays from 10 a.m.-6 p.m.; Thursdays through Saturdays from 10 a.m.-7 p.m.; and Sundays 10 a.m.-4 p.m.
