The Library: A World History
From the Publisher. A library is not just a collection of books, but also the buildings that house them. As varied and inventive as the volumes they hold, such buildings can be much more than the dusty, dark wooden shelves found in mystery stories or the catacombs of stacks in the basements of academia. From the great dome of the Library of Congress, to the white facade of the Seinäjoki Library in Finland, to the ancient ruins of the library of Pergamum in modern Turkey, the architecture of a library is a symbol of its time as well as of its builders’ wealth, culture, and learning.
Architectural historian James Campbell and photographer Will Pryce traveled the globe together, visiting and documenting over eighty libraries that exemplify the many different approaches to thinking about and designing libraries. The result of their travels, The Library: A World History is one of the first books to tell the story of library architecture around the world and through time in a single volume, from ancient Mesopotamia to modern China and from the beginnings of writing to the present day. As these beautiful and striking photos reveal, each age and culture has reinvented the library, molding it to reflect their priorities and preoccupations—and in turn mirroring the history of civilization itself. Campbell’s authoritative yet readable text recounts the history of these libraries, while Pryce’s stunning photographs vividly capture each building’s structure and atmosphere.
To some of us, there is nothing more handsome or interesting than a wall of books. This is the book for us. For its preparation, the author, director of studies in architecture and art history at Queens’ College, Cambridge, and his masterful photographer visited 82 libraries in 21 countries. Their chapters carry us chronologically from “Lost Beginnings” to “The Future of Libraries in the Electronic Age” with stops along the way including “Cupboards, Chains and Stalls” (the 16th century) and “Angels, Frescoes, and Secret Doors” (the 18th). The oldest extant example we see is the ancient Roman Library of Celsus in Ephesus, Turkey, c.135 AD, and the most recent the 2012 Liyuan Library in Jiaojiehe, China, designed by Chinese architect Li Xiaodong, its rustic twig-faced exterior hiding an elegantly finished interior.
The book amply demonstrates the changing nature of functions in library design and also changes in technology and in books themselves. We see the results of trying to discourage those things that endanger books: fire, insects, mold (or, in this book, mould), and theft. We are told that in the beautiful 18th-century libraries at Mafra and Coimbra, both in Portugal, colonies of tiny bats are used to feed on book-destructive beetles. “The only downside is that the bats leave droppings … that need to be cleaned up every morning.” Electronic surveillance systems now play the role once played by locking books away and chaining them to desks. And “damp Alexandria was one of the worst places in Egypt to choose as the site of a great library.”
Missing, intentionally we assume, is Seattle’s much-touted Central Library designed by Rem Koolhaas in 2004, and mentioned but not shown are any of Andrew Carnegie’s roughly two thousand American libraries in which so many of us first fell in love with books. But these omissions are petty compared with the wonders and delights that have been included. Of all these, my guess is that the author’s own favorite may be the marble-clad Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale, designed by Gordon Bunshaft of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill and finished in 1965. A full-page image of its interior, with the translucent marble furnishing a golden glow, introduces the 20th-century chapter, and Campbell says, “The result [of Bunshaft’s design], executed with great skill, is a space of almost unimaginable power and simplicity.”
Not sidestepped, however, is the topic that casts a shadow over this whole subject. In his preface the author asks “[W]ill this study serve merely as a memorial to a defunct building type?” The book’s final words answer that “… humankind has created an extraordinary variety of spaces in which to read, to think, to dream and to celebrate knowledge. As long as humankind continues to value these activities, it will continue to build places to house them. Whether they will involve books or will still be called libraries, only time will tell.” If indeed what we now know as the library disappears, this book will be the perfect reminder of all that we will have lost.
Announcements
Now is Better by Stefan Sagmeister
Now is Better
By Stefan Sagmeister
Publisher: Phaidon Press
Published: October 2023
Combining art, design, history, and quantitative analysis, transforms data sets into stunning artworks that underscore his positive view of human progress, inspiring us to think about the future with much-needed hope.
Design Emergency: Building a Better Future by Alice Rawsthorn and Paola Antonelli
Design Emergency: Building a Better Future
By Alice Rawsthorn and Paola Antonelli
Publisher: Phaidon Press
Published: May 2022
Rawsthorn and Antonelli tell the stories of the remarkable designers, architects, engineers, artists, scientists, and activists who are at the forefront of positive change worldwide. Focusing on four themes—Technology, Society, Communication, and Ecology—the authors present a unique portrait of how our great creative minds are developing new design solutions to the major challenges of our time, while helping us to benefit from advances in science and technology.
.png)
Why Design Matters: Conversations with the World’s Most Creative People by Debbie Millman
Why Design Matters: Conversations with the World's Most Creative People
By Debbie Millman
Publisher: Harper Design
Published: February 22, 2022
Debbie Millman—author, educator, brand consultant, and host of the widely successful and award-winning podcast “Design Matters”—showcases dozens of her most exciting interviews, bringing together insights and reflections from today’s leading creative minds from across diverse fields.
Milton Glaser: POP by Steven Heller, Mirko Ilić, and Beth Kleber
Milton Glaser: POP
By Steven Heller, Mirko Ilić, and Beth Kleber
Publisher: The Monacelli Press
Published: March 2023
This collection of work from graphci design legend Milton Glaser’s Pop period features hundreds of examples of the designer’s work that have not been seen since their original publication, demonstrating the graphic revolution that transformed design and popular culture.
.png)
Meet Me by the Fountain: An Inside History of the Mall by Alexandra Lange
Meet Me by the Fountain: An Inside History of the Mall
By Alexandra Lange
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Published: June 2022
Chronicles postwar architects’ and merchants’ invention of the shopping mall, revealing how the design of these marketplaces played an integral role in their cultural ascent. Publishers Weekly writes, “Contending that malls answer ‘the basic human need’ of bringing people together, influential design critic Lange advocates for retrofitting abandoned shopping centers into college campuses, senior housing, and ‘ethnocentric marketplaces’ catering to immigrant communities. Lucid and well researched, this is an insightful study of an overlooked and undervalued architectural form.”
Die Fläche: Design and Lettering of the Vienna Secession, 1902–1911 (Facsimile Edition) by Diane V. Silverthorne, Dan Reynolds, and Megan Brandow-Faller
Die Fläche: Design and Lettering of the Vienna Secession, 1902–1911 (Facsimile Edition)
By Diane V. Silverthorne, Dan Reynolds, and Megan Brandow-Faller
Publisher: Letterform Archives Books
Published: October 2023
This facsimile edition of Die Fläche, recreates every page of the formative design periodical in full color and at original size, accompanied by essays that contextualize the work, highlighting contributions by pathbreaking women, innovative lettering artists, and key practitioners of the new “surface art,” including Rudolf von Larisch, Alfred Roller, and Wiener Werkstätte founders Koloman Moser and Josef Hoffmann.
Popular NowWeekMonth
- The Book We Need Now: New from Stefan Sagmeister
- Quote of the Day: Witold Rybczynski & Paradise Planned
- Summer Reading for Design Lovers: The Story of Architecture
- One Book and Why: Design School Dean Frederick Steiner Recommends . . .
- One Book and Why: Graphic Designer Stefan Sagmeister Recommends . . .
- Book List of the Week: Milton Glaser
- Imagining Information: Symbols, Isotype, and Book Design
- “The Notebooks and Drawings of Louis I. Kahn” To Be Reissued in a New Facsimile Edition
- Do We Need a Completely New Approach to Marketing Books?
- Question Everything: A Conversation with OK-RM’s Rory McGrath
Recent Articles
