An Interview With Dani Brzozowski, director of development, Open Books

FundRaising Success: How do you fund your mission?
Dani Brzozowski: Open Books’ vision is a renewable, organic and unending cycle of funding and programming. When the bookstore opens next spring, sales of donated used books will fund the literacy programming that will take place, literally, in-house. The first floor of our new space will be devoted to retail: more than 50,000 used books in a fun, funky, colorful and comfortable Chicago environment complete with a fake fireplace, ancestral oil paintings, a suit of armor, a multitude of bird cages, a constellation of twinkling lights, a children’s area furnished with giant foam books, and lots of secret seats just big enough for a reader and a book. The rest of the space will be classrooms, computer labs, and offices for other literacy organizations in the city. The hope is that this model will bring Chicago’s fight for literacy physically together in one inspiring, creative and powerful illiteracy center.