Andrew Pringle

Nestled among a line of independent bookstores, you’ll find Andrew Pringle. Focusing more on the older or antiquated books this is the bookshop for those who like books that appear to have a reasonable degree of history behind them — I love these types of books (each one of them feels as if they have their own story).
For those to whom this is of interest there are a few first edition books here, but to me personally these aren’t worth the extra money — I couldn’t care less if they were first or last off the press. That said, the books here are worth looking through especially with so many neighbouring bookshops.

This isn’t one of my favourites of the West Port strip of second-​hand bookshops, but it’ still pretty good. And it gets kudos for being just what it is: a second hand book shop.
I’ve always felt slightly more intimidated by the books in here because they actually look organised and stuff. I always enter a second-​hand book shop knowing that I won’t be able to find anything, even if it is there, because it’s so messy, my book is probably snuggled safely amidst mess, away from my prying hands. But not so at Andrew Pringle. Here, the books look excessively dignified. If books could.
The shop has the subtitle: Scottish and General Antiquarian Books. And that’s exactly what it is. And Antiquarian books, as far as I’m concerned are dignified-​looking.
You should probably have done the West Port second-​hand book shop crawl by now, but if you haven’t, this one isn’t one to miss out on.

Pringle Books is moderately dwarfed by the neighbouring Armchair Books, but it’s a lovely, musty old bookshop for those interested in antiquarian varieties.
More sepcialised than Armchair Books (and a little more expensive), Pringle plays host to an older, well preserved number of hardback dictionaries and such, along with some classics. But its main selling point is its vast collection of old maps.
Even if you’re not interested in collecting or selling them on, they would look gorgeous in a study area or office. I love things which have been stained brown through time, and these maps are in good condition while looking rustic.
I can imagine the maps looking very swish in a bureau, like the ones you see in old movies where a studious professor is smoking a pipe and stretching out in a big old leather chair. Especially good for collectors but worth having a browse if you’re blitzing the number of other book stores in the area.