I turned to film and literature when I was in total solitude to have comfort. Those things have been an amazing comfort to me in my life.

TESS POLLOK: You’re the founder of des pair books, an independent bookstore–you’ve had a few iterations already, right? But you’re currently at a brick-and-mortar location in Echo Park.

ADDISON KIRST: Yeah. Technically, we were founded in 2019, but we weren’t a store back then. The first thing we did was publish a collection of essays by Kaitlyn Kramer. I did that with my friend Clarice De Veyra who I founded des pair with. We had both just moved to New York and were desperate for a new project, so I was just like, let’s do this. I was working at my gallery job uptown but was getting really invested in the books and movies I was watching. I was so grateful to have those outlets. Clarice and I started talking about how we could integrate those interests into our larger community and we wanted to start publishing writers who we felt were not getting their due. Kaitlyn is a great example because she’s an incredible essayist–it was really fun and fulfilling to put out a collection of her work. We were just selling out of print books on the weekends in Brooklyn.

POLLOK: Having no friends, moving to a new city–those moments can be really clarifying in life. They can help you focus on your true center.

KIRST: That’s a really eloquent way to put it, I definitely feel the same way. I turned to film and to literature when I was in total solitude to have comfort. I was so grateful to have those things in my life. Publishing is amazing because you actually get to hold the finished product in your hands. Our latest book is Catherine Mulligan, a self-titled collection of her paintings. There’s nothing that makes me happier in the world than publishing, truly.

POLLOK: When did you guys make the transition to being a formal store?

KIRST: That was a long journey. At first, we published the Kaitlyn Kramer book and a few other books–until COVID-19 happened. At the time, I felt a lot of pressure to come home to my family in LA so I moved around that time, and our current location was for rent. It was a great deal because of the pandemic, so I knew at that moment that it was a now or never situation. I didn’t even book my flight home from New York until I’d signed the lease here. We opened in March 2021 and we’ve been open for about four years now.

des pair books in Echo Park, Los Angeles

POLLOK: What inspires you as a publisher?

KIRST: I studied fine art in college and that’s always been a huge source of inspiration for me. I love the grotesque, the uncanny, the unspoken, the outsiders–all forms of secretive yuck. Catherine Mulligan’s work is like that. Catherine’s work is also a beautiful hybrid of LA and New York, not that they’re comparable in any way, but her textural output and representation of the two cities is really tongue-in-cheek and definitely emblematic of what I’m looking for when I’m looking for a new artist to publish. Her work reminds me of Paul McCarthy, Mike Kelley.

POLLOK: How do you balance left brain with right brain in your line of work? Because you’re a publisher and a creative, but you’re also a business owner.

KIRST: I try to lead with my creative instincts. Business comes second. But I’ve learned from the four years I’ve spent doing this that it’s completely forced upon you. I’m not just talking about the numbers and the management, I’m talking about people coming up to you with new opportunities all the time and you have to be smart and shrewd about the decisions you make. I always have to ask myself, does this benefit the store in any way? Obviously, I want to help out as many people as I can, but it’s challenging to run a business–people are always like, can you put my flyer in the window? Can you carry my magazine? I want to lift them up, but at the end of the day it’s like, the business has to last in order for me to even be able to put a flyer up in the window. So it’s a give and take ecosystem.

POLLOK: Do you have any advice for other working artists who are trying to move forward with projects like these, creatively and financially?

KIRST: First of all, thank you for calling me a working artist. [Laughs] I think it’s easy to be led astray thinking about what other people want or what you’re supposed to be doing. At the end of the day, if you’re going to do something, it should be what you want. If it goes up in flames, at least you were true to yourself. When you’re running a business, you have to have a knack for knowing what sells. I’m only just now acquiescing to that because, for a long time, I only wanted to sell what I was passionate about–over time, I’ve become more forgiving about carrying things like cards and candles. I would say it’s all about finding that balance between being practical and staying true to the things you love.

POLLOK: I think even though it’s difficult to make art and run a business, you have to love and be invigorated by the challenge. Because what would you be doing with your time, otherwise?

KIRST: It’s funny because I studied fine art in college but I knew I wasn’t going to be a fine artist afterwards. I was just working in galleries. I wanted to find a way to bring my hobbies into my projects and business more. At this point, running the bookstore just feels like survival–there’s nothing to lose, so let’s just fucking go for it.

des pair books in Echo Park, Los Angeles

POLLOK: Do you have any regrets or feel like you made any mistakes? I’m wondering if you ever did anything where you would warn people, you know, “This is what not to do.”

KIRST: It’s hard because I have this innate impulse to say yes to everything. It always comes down to that balance for me. There’ve been situations where I’ve said yes to a certain event or something, and afterwards I’m left with regret because I’m like, Wow, you just gave away your space for free to so-and-so. There’s many of those. I learn every fucking day I’m doing this. That’s my true and honest response. It can be so simple to be cynical and pessimistic, but at the end of the day, I try to have a good attitude about things. I feel so fucking lucky to have this space. I’ve also taken on more work outside of the store, recently, which has been really nice–it allows me a little reprieve from having to constantly be here as a representative.

It’s frustrating that we live in an era when so many dumb people have so much money. [Laughs] It’s easy to look at them and wish they could give me X amount of money so I can do what I want with the store. But they don’t owe that to you, you’re in your own lane when you run a business. Again, it’s easy to compare, but it’s better to be grateful–I have this brick-and-mortar and that’s actually a lot.

POLLOK: How do you curate the books you’re going to carry at des pair?

KIRST: It’s books I’ve read, books I want to read, and some community recommendations. I’ve started bringing in art books more, especially out-of-print stuff that I feel would be cool for people to get a look at. The shop is very much a representation of my own interests. My favorite compliment is when people tell me they saw a book on the shelves that they didn’t know, picked it up, and realized they loved it. That’s the recipe for the experience I want people to have when they’re in the shop.

POLLOK: Selling art books definitely tracks for a fine arts major.

KIRST: I went to UCLA and the way the program is set up, you have to study every medium and it’s only in your last year that you get to specify a focus. They’re trying to prepare you for your MFA, in a way. I went in aimless and I came out with a passion for drawing and hand-built ceramics. I don’t like putting myself in the realm of the art world because it’s such a critical place. I feel more comfortable being creative in the publishing world, where I can decide what things are going to look like and how things are going to be framed.

POLLOK: Do you have any future plans for the store?

KIRST: We worked with Jeffrey Deitch for a minute, which was fun. We had a store inside the gallery for a year and a half. It made less and less sense over time to keep it–it was like the step-child inside the gallery that wasn’t getting enough love. I would love to continue to build out my library curation sector of the business. We’ve worked with a few huge retail brands tailoring a book selection that works with their stores and it would be great to keep those partnerships going whether for fashion, interior designers, or individual clients. For now, what we have going is absolutely perfect for me.

ADDISON KIRST is an independent publisher and the owner of des pair books in Echo Park, Los Angeles.

TESS POLLOK is a writer and the editor of Animal Blood.