The Great Good Place: Cafes, Coffee Shops, Bookstores, Bars, Hair Salons, and Other Hangouts at the Heart of a Community

by Ray Oldenburg

Book Overview

The landmark survey that celebrates all the places where people hang out--and is helping to spawn their revival
A New York Times Book Review Editor's Choice

"Third places," or "great good places," are the many public places where people can gather, put aside the concerns of home and work (their first and second places), and hang out simply for the pleasures of good company and lively conversation. They are the...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1569246815
• ISBN13: 9781569246818
• Release Date: August 1999
• Publisher: Da Capo Press
• Length: 384 Pages
• Weight: 1.00 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 5.9" x 8.9"

Customer Reviews

Bad Urban Planning and the death of Public Life

Expecting a rehash of many of the now famous concepts of the "New Urbanism", I delayed actually reading this book for a long time. When I finally did it knocked me for a lovely, dizzy, exciting loop! Oldenburg may have put his finger directly on the reason why life in modern America has such an un-balanced, edgy, distressed feel to it. Bad planning! 50 years of letting officials and corporations extinguish our corner taverns, drugstores and other hang-outs has resulted in the extinguishing of our public lives. Something that work and family simply cannot compensate us for. And Oldenburg makes his surprisingly compelling case for these humblest of structures in a refreshingly brash, cranky tone. I began reading this book because of a certain technical interest and ended with my view of American life being, perhaps forever altered.

Heartfelt and extremely readable.

When was the last time you walked to your friendly, neighborhood tavern to shoot the breeze with the regulars? Oh, that's right. There is no such place. Find out why you'd be happier if there were.