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

"Third places," or "great good places," are all the wonderful places where people gather, put aside the concerns of home and work (our first and second places), and hang out simply for the pleasures of good company and lively conversation. Third places are the heart of a community's social vitality, and have long been central to grassroots democracy. Author Ray Oldenburg is renowned for coining the term "third place." In this book, he portrays, probes, and promotes these great good places: coffee houses, cafés, bookstores, hair salons, bars, bistros, and more, both past and present - and offers a vision for their revitalization.

Eloquent and visionary, this book offers a compelling argument for the importance of informal public and civic life. It explains how third places are essential to community health and individual well-being. In the years since its first appearance in 1989, The Great Good Place has inspired policy makers and entrepreneurs from Seattle to Singapore, Osaka to Oslo. They have opened coffee houses, bookstores, community centers, bars, and other establishments - proudly acknowledging their indebtedness to Ray Oldenburg's ideas.

"The great value of this book is that Mr. Oldenburg has given us an insightful and extremely useful new lens through which to look at a familiar problem." -Roberta Gratz, New York Times Book Review

"Well-written, informative, and often entertaining." -Newark Star-Ledger

"Examines gathering places and reminds us how important they are. People need the "third place" to nourish sociability." -Parade

"Oldenburg believes that the powerful need in humans to associate with one another will inevitably lead to the revival of places where, as the theme song to Cheers, the TV show, so aptly puts it, 'everyone knows your name.' We'll drink to that." -Booklist