“Financial and accounting problems” dictated the end of the bookstore founded in 1840.

“Neither public institutions, private investors, bookseller partners nor Ler Devagar’s shareholders and friends were able to face Ferin’s financial and accounting problem. Sales fell drastically and the Ferin bookstore entered a cycle from which it would be difficult to recover. Following the example of so many other stores in Baixa that were forced to close their doors”, according to a report by ECO.

In 2017, José Pinho, owner of the Ler Devagar bookstore, was contacted to try to save the century-old bookstore in the capital, which was already at risk of closing. He bought the bookstore, the estate and the entire human resources structure for one euro, but inherited a “monumental accumulated historical debt”.

José Pinho managed to give the bookstore a new direction, but “when the house finally seemed to be in order”, the Covid-19 pandemic hit. In 2021, the businessman was diagnosed with an incurable oncological disease and died in May of this year.

His son João Pinho reports that this year “was doubly sad”, due to José’s death and now due to the closing of Ferin’s doors. However, promising to follow his father's premise — “whenever a bookstore closes, Ler Devagar will open another” —, he has just opened a bookstore in Bairro Alto.

“A bookstore that is also a cultural centre where you can read and buy books, watch films, have a drink, listen to a concert or a reading session. And so, at Casa do Comum in Bairro Alto, Ler Devagar returns once again to its original vocation: to reinvent the concept of a Bookstore, at the same time creating spaces for meeting and access to all artistic and word expressions”, highlights the administration.

“We hope that this shock can help us think about what we can do differently in the future so as not to lose the spaces we love most in the city”, concludes José Pinho’s son, in a statement.

Long history

The Ferin bookstore was founded in 1840 by the Belgian Jean Batiste Ferin, who settled in Lisbon during the Napoleonic Wars. Jean-Baptiste had 11 children, seven of whom began working in professions linked to books.

Two of his daughters, Maria Teresa and Gertrudes, opened a Reading Office in Chiado, Lisbon, where the Ferin bookstore is located, which functioned more like a library. People paid to rent the books and it was with this money that they were able to increase the number of copies of the Cabinet. Later, Maria Teresa transformed the Reading Cabinet into the current bookstore.

From that time until the middle of the 20th century, the bookstore also had a bookbinding workshop. King D. Pedro V had all his books bound in it and even decided to name it the Official Binder of the Portuguese Royal House. Since 1840, great personalities from the country's literary life have passed through Ferin, including Eça de Queiroz.