Fill’er Up, a beloved Midway coffee shop housed in a 1930s gas station, closed in 2024. Now, the colorful building will reopen under the ownership of an author and a skateboarder.
Claire Carusillo and Galen DeKemper will open Storyboard this summer.
Carusillo said visitors will be able to grab a cup of coffee, then browse a wide selection of skateboards and books inside the cheery red-and-blue building.
“We are doing new books, used books,” she said. “We have a lot of vintage paperbacks, and we have a lot of literary fiction in here that’s new. We're also going to have a pretty robust pen, pencil, and notebook section in here – I love paper goods and desktop goods – and we have a pretty sizable zine collection as well.”
Both partners are lifelong readers and writers. DeKemper is taking charge of the skate side of the shop – from tiny fingerboards to full-size skate decks – while Carusillo will focus on the bookstore portion.
DeKemper said they want to create a “third space” outside home and work or school for people to find community.
“Skate shops are the first place I go to when I’m in a city,” he said. “I find that skateboarding is one of the ways that I’ve met most of the people I know.”
The two say Storyboard is designed to invite locals and visitors to stop by often and stay awhile.
“As Midway has sort of blown up since we bought this place two years ago, in terms of tourism, I love the idea of this becoming a place that, if people come to this area yearly, this is the place that they remember and want to go when they go to town,” Carusillo said.
Carusillo and DeKemper plan to open Storyboard early this summer. Carusillo’s debut novel, “The Responsible Party,” comes out in August.
Storyboard will be the second bookstore to open in Midway in the past two years, along with women-owned bookshop Folklore.
