Two marble lions stand guard at the Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, watching visitors as they come and go from the research library on corner of Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street. The idea for the Beaux-Arts landmark first came about in 1895, when the consolidation of the Astor and Lenox Libraries propelled the founders of the New York Public Library to build an enormous institution to compete with Paris and London.
Designed by Carrère and Hastings, the historic building contains an estimated 15 million items from medieval manuscripts and ancient Japanese scrolls to contemporary novels and comic books.
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The abbey library is one of the oldest and most beautiful libraries in the world. Already in the 8th century, the monastery of St. Gall had an important collection of books which quickly grew. Early architectural plans that depict a library attached to the main church of the Abbey of Saint Gall suggest the collection dates back to around 820 CE.
The abbey library, which undoubtedly houses the most beautiful secular Baroque room in Switzerland, now contains 170,000 works. Of these, 50,000 are exhibited in the Baroque hall, where you can also see the 2,700-year-old Egyptian mummy of Schepenese. The heart of the library's collection is the 2100 manuscripts, some of which can be seen in the exhibitions. As the abbey’s catalogue of science writings and manuscripts grew, the collection moved to its lavishly decorated Baroque-style hall by Peter Thumb in the mid-18th century. Nearly 160,00 volumes make up the intricately carved-wood shelves, all of which are available for public use.
The abbey library was listed with the abbey district as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1983.
Starfield Library Seoul, in Starfield COEX Mall, the world’s largest underground shopping mall, stands out for its unconventional approach to what a library can be. Its eye-catching look, thanks to its shelving that goes all the way up to the ceiling, makes it a popular attraction with tourists and Seoulites alike. The library is presented as an open public place where everyone can take a break and immerse themselves. Sitting inside, the Starfield Library houses nearly 50,000 books and magazines spanning genres.
Traditionally the library is an institution managed by the government (national, provincial or municipal). In the case of the Starfield library, it is private interests and in this case the Shinsegae company, which owns the place. Since 1963, this group, which belongs to the chaebol (large group) Samsung, has specialized in the establishment of shopping centers, supermarkets and in fashion. The group spent $5 million to build this cultural space open to all and it will cost them nearly $500,000 a year in maintenance costs.
Lights from the two-story athenaeum cause the space to glow throughout the day and welcome in visitors to relax on the plush sofas. Each month, the library hosts a range of events from author lectures to art exhibitions.
The vast complex of buildings of the Clementinum, one of the largest in Europe, was built between the middle of the 16th century and the middle of the 18th century for the Jesuit brothers. The visit includes the astronomical tower from the top of which meteorological readings have taken place since 1775, as well as the Meridian room and the Baroque library, decorated with frescoes and housing precious terrestrial globes. The Mirror Chapel, with its magnificent interiors and unique set of mirrors, regularly hosts classical music concerts.
With its ornate ceiling frescoes by Jan Hiebl and rich gold-and-mahogany spiral pillars, it’s no wonder why the Klementinum is touted as “the Baroque pearl of Prague.” The library first opened in 1722 as a part of a Jesuit university but now serves as the National Library of the Czech Republic, housing over 20,00 volumes of foreign theological literature. A portrait of Emperor Joseph II sits at the head of the hall to commemorate his work in preserving books from abolished monastic libraries, many of which remain in the hall today.
Korean architect Eun Young Yi, based in Germany, completed the design of the new library in Stuttgart in October 2011. Cubic in shape, the exterior facade of the library – made up of frosted glass bricks encased in a concrete frame – is characterized by a regular series of openings which gives a grid-like appearance.
Four entrances distributed on each facade collectively lead to the entrance hall inspired by Étienne Boullée's "Cenotaph of Newton" while the heart and core of the library follows the structure and organization of the ancient pantheon.
The gleaming white surfaces and crisp lines create a dreamy and relaxed atmosphere within the Stuttgart City Library. A central oculus illuminates the interior of the hall above which is the library itself which takes the form of a funnel on 5 floors entirely covered with books. The interior circulation is arranged in a spiral between the reading gallery areas, allowing a good distribution of the light coming from the skylight.
Taking design cues from the Pantheon in Rome, German-based Yi Architects took a minimalist approach toward designing the nine-story library with an open multi-floor reading room shaped like an upside-down pyramid. The only color within the cube building comes from the thousands of books that line the shelves.
The Bibliotheca Alexandrina is a library and cultural center located on the shores of the Mediterranean in the city of Alexandria, Egypt. Work began in 1995 and cost $220 million. It was inaugurated on October 16, 2002. It then had the largest reading room in the world, occupying seven of the eleven floors of the main building, offering 2,000 seats, 180 study rooms and eventually accommodating eight million books.
Bibliotheca Alexandrina aims to recapture the spirit and scholarship of the ancient world’s largest and most comprehensive library. The original Library of Alexandria housed the largest collection of books and manuscripts of its time and was regarded as the capital of knowledge before it was destroyed in a fire nearly 2,000 years ago.
Designed by the Norwegian architecture firm Snøhetta, the new institution includes a library room with room for eight million books, four museums, four art galleries, a planetarium, and a manuscript-restoration laboratory. Etches of 120 different scripts cover the gray Aswan granite walls as a tribute to the evolution of human language.
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