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

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Robert Smirke’s much loved 1857 British Library is one of the most famous examples of the radial plan, which was introduced into library design to enable the efficient monitoring of readers by librarians

Essays on books and the buildings that house them