"Niimura created a place where one can do just that. Chinatown's Paper Plant Co. is her stationery outpost, made of two small storefronts that share a space with Thank You Coffee and boast outdoor seating. A communal destination since 2020, the shop has earned a reputation for specializing in notebooks, stickers and pens from Japan. Or, as Niimura describes Paper Plant's aesthetic: "cute.""
"Paper Plant will on Oct. 11-12 play host to Bungu LA, believed to be the first proper stationery festival in the city. Niimura has handpicked Bungu's 60 or so exhibitors, with the vast majority of them traveling here from Japan. Bungu is inspired by similar events Niimura has gone to in Tokyo or New York. Paper Plant, for instance, exhibited last year at a festival hosted by Brooklyn's Yoseka Stationery."
""When we pick something and we all go, 'Oh my gosh, it's so cute,' then we know it's going to do really well," Niimura, 45, says. "I don't know how in Japan they always come up with cute scenarios and cute scenes and cute gestures. It's almost like there's a school on how to draw dogs doing cute things, cats doing cute things.""
Friedia Niimura moved from Japan to Los Angeles in her mid-20s and shifted from aspirations in acting and fashion to focus on stationery. She noticed a scarcity of specialty stationery boutiques in L.A. and drew on memories of abundant Japanese shops. Niimura opened Chinatown's Paper Plant Co., a two–storefront stationery outpost opened in 2020 that shares space with Thank You Coffee and offers outdoor seating. Paper Plant specializes in Japanese notebooks, stickers and pens and cultivates a 'cute' aesthetic. Niimura curated Bungu LA, a two-day stationery festival with about 60 exhibitors, most traveling from Japan and inspired by Tokyo and New York events.
Read at Los Angeles Times
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