The Fremont bookstore that started as a disco-tiled cart at Pride events in 2023 is about to double its footprint on Capitol Hill.

Charlie's Queer Books will open a second location at 1122 E Pike St., in a two-story former car-dealership building roughly twice the size of the original shop at 465 N. 36th St. in Fremont.

The store is expected to open in time for the holidays, The Stranger first reported.

The café and wine bar planned for the lower level will take longer to launch.

Owner Charlie Hunts said the Fremont location, housed in a decades-old home, has simply run out of room. Events there max out at about 50 people after merchandise shelves and rolling bookcases are pushed aside.

The Capitol Hill space will include a children's reading nook tucked beneath a new staircase, full ADA accessibility and an event loft that Hunts told KIRO 7 can hold more people on its own than the entire Fremont store.

"Now, we don't have enough wall space to even add bookcases if we wanted to," Hunts told KIRO 7.

Hunts and his wife, Madeline Burchard, co-own the business. He launched it in summer 2023 as a disco-tiled mobile book cart at Seattle Pride events.

The brick-and-mortar Fremont store opened that November. It became Seattle's first dedicated LGBTQ+ bookstore in nearly two decades, filling a gap left when Bailey/Coy Books on Broadway closed in 2009, according to Seattle City of Literature.

As of 2024, it was one of fewer than a dozen exclusively LGBTQ+ bookstores in the country, The Stranger reported.

The new E Pike address sits next to Unicorn Bar and across the street from Wildrose, in what The Stranger described as Seattle's original gayborhood.

The storefront previously housed Post Options, a mailbox and business center that operated for 13 years before closing after a 2025 electrical fire, Capitol Hill Seattle Blog reported.

Landlord Stephen Romano at 12th & Pike St. Associates offered lease terms the owners called manageable.

Hunts told KIRO 7 that most of the books on his shelves have been banned from libraries, schools or other institutions.

The American Library Association has reported that 39% of banned or challenged books involve LGBTQ+ authors or subject matter.

Hunts said he sees the Capitol Hill store as a gathering option for queer people beyond nightlife.

Burchard told The Stranger the store carries weight beyond retail.

"Because we're in a cross section of record book bans and anti-LGBT legislation, our bookstore holds more responsibility than the average small business," she said.

The café and wine bar will allow the store to host free programming, Hunts told The Stranger, including silent book clubs, open mics and author readings.