Main Street Momentum and More: The Collective Spirit Driving Hobart’s Economic Growth

Story and Photos By Isabella Belmonte | SUNY Institute for Local News 

HOBART – The quiet village of Hobart, New York in the Catskills, is lined on both sides of its walkable Main Street with historic 19th century homes and commercial buildings that were transformed two decades ago by a handful of energetic bibliophiles who opened seven bookstores, earning it the distinguishing name: The Book Village of the Catskills. Visitors coming from all over the world, including Canada and Mexico, pick up brochures that map out the Village’s secondhand and specialty shops. Attracting readers with a niche for these shops and collaborating with the local business owners keeps the community running. 

At the heart of Hobart stands the Book Village Inn & Bar, dating to 1890, a preserved five-room inn and boutique hotel, restaurant, and bar. What’s new is owner, Federico Zimerman, “who is the best!” according to Julie Rockefeller of The Shops Around the Corner, home of the Hobart Exchange and three other local shops. 

Julie, who also volunteers as Coordinator of the Village’s Community Alliance, describes Hobart as a business culture that is deeply collaborative and interdependent.  

“It only functions because everybody works together,” she explains. “Like Megan from Hipstitch Academy, who teaches, would not be able to staff her shop at the Exchange. She contributes to the rent, and one of the other Exchange partners runs her business for her when she’s not here.”  

The Shops Around the Corner, four businesses in one, have a collaborative spirit stretching beyond a single shop. It features new and used books - from Quarry Books—selling mystery, sci-fi and fantasy--alongside art and music made by Susana Caban, a prior jewelry and wax modelmaker. The walls are filled with original art and prints, shelves are adorned with tea towels, woodcarvings, bird carvings and botanical pieces. 

“Beyond retail, we have chair yoga, book group meetings, art classes, and a knitting group that meets twice a week. Tomorrow we’re having a program on the history of fire towers,” Julie says. Megan Avery, who runs a sewing studio in nearby Harpersfield, teaches lessons and workshops through local programs and schools, helping sustain the vibrant energy of the Book Village. 

Book Village Inn owner Federico Zimerman, born and raised in Argentina, moved to Hobart in May 2024 with his wife, two dogs, a cat and $1,000. 

“I moved here… to live the true American dream,” he says. 

The Book Village Inn & Bar is his first restaurant, but not his first entrepreneurial venture. Recently, the restaurant’s name was changed from the Bull and Garland to more closely home in on the Book Village branding, “which I think was a great decision,” he says. 

The inn’s first floor houses a restaurant and bar where nearly everything on the menu is homemade. Federico’s culinary style reflects a life spent traveling to more than 60 countries across every continent. 

“Our dishes try to blend Argentinian flavor, heavily Mediterranean inspired,” he explains. “Most of Buenos Aires was made up of Italian and Spanish Immigrants, therefore we mix the flavors with a lot of beef due to the abundance of beef in Argentina.” 

Summer highlights include choripan - a classic Argentinian sandwich combining chorizo and “pan”, or bread, and picanha sliders featuring sirloin on a bun. Both typically topped with chimichurri “made the correct way with no cilantro or I get mad” Federico states earnestly. 

The menu also features skirt steak, empanadas, crab croquettes and clam chowder, mirroring  Argentine roots and regional tastes. 

Kylie Russel, who works as the bartender, was the Inn’s first hire says she has been serving in fine dining since she was 20 and joined the Inn in August, helping build the hospitable environment. 

“I love to see people happy and enjoying the food I make,” Federico says. 

Frederico has just bought two of Hobart’s treasured bookstores, Creative Corners and New York Ephemera from long-time owner Kathy Duyer, who is retired from the business but not from the fabric of Hobart’s civic or social life. Excited to run two bookstores and coffee shops along with his online property management, which oversees 90 properties, and a company, specializing in pricing strategies and revenue management for Airbnb hosts, Frederico is a busy—and happy—man.  

The preservation of place, paired with small business entrepreneurs, defines 

Hobart’s character, which is one of the reasons Frederico and Julie chose to build a life there. 

In Hobart, success is not rooted in competition, but in friendship and cooperation. The Hobart Exchange is a great example of those virtues. The Book Village Inn & Bar is a new chapter in Village’s story. Blending literature, a cozy escape, and Latin flavor into the mist of the Catskills town of Hobart. 

This story was created by student reporters through the OnNY Community Media Lab, a program of SUNY Oneonta and the SUNY Institute for Local News.