Library
In various incarnations, from the medieval bibliotheca and aristocratic wunderkammer, to the public library and modern mediatheque, buildings for books have shaped human culture. The library is an immemorial building type, a repository of knowledge, rooted in place and resonating across time. Its presence, or absence, is intimately bound up with the rise, or fall, of civilisation. Emblematic of the transcendent power of imagination and intellect, buildings for books stand as crucibles of memory and cultural identity

BookWorm in Mumbai, India, by Nudes
Alys HargreavesA pop-up library in Mumbai’s Fort neighbourhood encourages children and young people to read and play
Border library and sports centre in Agua Prieta, Mexico by Fernanda Canales Arquitectura
Pablo Emilio Aguilar ReyesIn Agua Prieta, a Mexican town on the US border, two public projects by Fernanda Canales Arquitectura offer a sense of rootedness
Typology: Libraries
Oriel PrizemanIn this piece from November 2011, Oriel Prizeman examines six recent public library projects in the first of a major new quarterly series on typology