The Strowbridge Hardware building’s renovation, by Bora Architecture and Interiors, added seismic bracing while leaving its original brick walls and wood columns intact.

The new home of Literary Arts is both a sign of the times and a hopeful way forward: a people-pleasing new chapter.

This nonprofit organization, which operated from a small office in downtown’s historic Pittock Block, has produced the Portland Book Festival for many years and offered year-round writing classes and workshops. But during the pandemic, despite losing half its revenue overnight, Literary Arts decided to expand.

Though leaving the Pittock is another loss for downtown, it’s the Central Eastside’s gain.

The new headquarters, on Southeast Grand Avenue near the Morrison Bridge, makes inspired use of the three-story circa-1904 Strowbridge Hardware building.

As part of a full-scale renovation by Bora Architecture & Interiors, seismic upgrading for this unreinforced masonry can be seen in new steel bracing along the interior perimeter. The building’s original bones are left exposed and celebrated: its beautifully weathered brick, wood floors and columns, and even old painted advertising the wall, for past occupants, including Citizens Bank and Lambert & Sargent Real Estate.

The new location nearly triples Literary Arts’ square footage, with expanded classroom and office space and a small podcast-recording studio. But the star attraction is a new bookshop and café, occupying the two-story storefront space in the front of the building (and continuing to its mezzanine).

Though Portland is already blessed with iconic Powell’s City of Books and other indie bookshops, Literary Arts can offer its niche: a place for book lovers and aspiring writers to come together. With abundant natural light pouring into the space — even on a cloudy day — and a knowledgeable staff eager to discuss books, the new Literary Arts headquarters is a little gem.

Though Grand Avenue, which doubles with Martin Luther King J. Boulevard as a multi-lane couplet (for Highway 99E), is not exactly a cozy pedestrian environment, a promising little arts and culture community is forming here.

Another beloved small bookstore, Mother Focault’s, recently moved into the ground floor of a building directly across from Literary Arts. Next door is the venerable Architectural Heritage Center.

Not only is the new Strowbridge Hardware Building move a wonderful new chapter for Literary Arts, but maybe, in some small way, a demonstration.

Though central-city retail vacancies in Portland and other large cities have proliferated in this age of Internet shopping, accelerated by the pandemic, brick-and-mortar bookstores have made a modest yet remarkable comeback. When paired with coffee bars, they’ve proven that people still seek what sociologist Ray Oldenburg called “third places,” away from home and work, to hang out and become inspired.

Given the persistence of retail storefront vacancies — not only due to the central city’s struggles but also due to a glut of such spaces predating the pandemic — there’s good reason to help more nonprofit arts organizations occupy such spaces.

Obviously, not all arts can offer a product to sell, like Literary Arts does here with books. Even so, these storefronts provide a window into their happenings, both figuratively and literally, increasing foot traffic while making a positive economic impact on the blocks and neighborhoods they inhabit.