Desert Island Comics, the Brooklyn, N.Y.–based comics shop specializing in alternative, independent, and underground comics, graphic novels, art books, screenprints, and zines, is reportedly being priced out of its storefront on Metropolitan Ave. in the rapidly gentrified neighborhood of Williamsburg, which it has occupied since 2008. It will lose its lease on December 30, per a letter dated September 26 and posted to the store’s Instagram account on October 3.
“Someone approached our landlord and offered almost double what we’re paying in rent, we have no lease, and landlord says we have to match it or vacate by January 1. Their price is untenable for our modestly successful business, and frankly it’s too much for anyone to pay. (The predatory business is a liquor store),” the store said in the Instagram post. “Been hesitant to post anything alarmist because there’s too many unknowns but it’s clear a change is gonna come. Much love to you beautiful people who have shared this dream with us. 💕”
The store has been a mainstay of New York City’s underground comics culture and scene since it was founded in 2008, by Gabriel Fowler, a former rock musician art handler, although it closed temporarily during Covid. The store publishes the quarterly comics anthology Smoke Signal and previously ran Comic Arts Brooklyn, a comic book convention held at Brooklyn’s Pratt Institute, from 2013–2019. Fowler published Rescue Party, which PW's review called a “varied, hopeful anthology” of 140 one-page comics, with Pantheon in July.
