Barnes & Noble is plotting a high-profile return to Fort Worth’s West 7th corridor, with plans on file for a new bookstore at Montgomery Plaza. The filing outlines a large-format shop with a café and a holiday-season opening goal, which would put a big-box bookseller back in the heart of the West 7th retail strip for the first time in decades.
City documents show Barnes & Noble is lined up to take about 20,000 square feet at Montgomery Plaza and build out a full café. Interior improvements are pegged at roughly $500,000, with construction scheduled to start in July and wrap up in late October, according to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. If that timeline holds, the store would be in position to catch the crucial holiday rush.
Where the Store Will Sit
Montgomery Plaza serves as a key anchor for the West 7th corridor and already pulls steady traffic with a roster of national retailers, including Target, HomeGoods and PetSmart. The center’s current tenant mix of large-format anchors and neighborhood-focused restaurants is laid out on Kimco Realty.
Dropping a bookstore of Barnes & Noble’s size into that environment would add a different kind of anchor to the strip, swapping out pure errand-running for a spot where people can linger over new releases and a cup of coffee.
A National Comeback for Bookstores
The Fort Worth proposal is part of a much bigger push. Barnes & Noble has said it plans to open roughly 60 stores in 2026 as part of a multiyear expansion. Retail TouchPoints reports a company spokesperson crediting the surge to a back-to-basics strategy: “Barnes & Noble is enjoying a period of tremendous growth as the strategy to hand control of each bookstore to its local booksellers has proven so successful.”
In other words, the national brand is betting hard on local flavor, and Fort Worth is in line to be part of that experiment.
What This Means for Fort Worth Readers
For now, Fort Worth readers still turn to the existing Barnes & Noble at the Hulen Shopping Center, and Tarrant County shoppers can already find other Barnes & Noble locations in nearby towns. The company’s store pages list hours and events for the local shops: Barnes & Noble Hulen Center and Barnes & Noble Burleson.
The new Montgomery Plaza filing does not spell out staffing levels or lock in an exact opening date, and construction schedules can slip. Still, the July-to-October buildout window on record would place the store squarely in the holiday season if work stays on track. City permit updates and leasing news from the center will provide the next concrete signs that Fort Worth’s newest big-box bookstore is getting close.
