Books

Location: Library at Unico Hotel, Madrid
 

Tiny Libraries, DIY Reading Rooms, and Other Micro Book Depots

Link: Tiny Libraries, DIY Reading Rooms and Other Micro Book Depots

Taltal Public Library by Murúa-Valenzuela

Link: Dezeen

Designed by architects Murúa-Valenzuela, this three-storey-high library is located in the coastal town of Taltal, Chile where it faces a public square and a recently completed theatre.

Photography by Macarena Álvarez.

Webcam to show Central Library refurb live

From: Manchester Evening News

Book-lovers will soon be given an insight into the transformation of Manchester’s Central Libra­ry under plans to fit a webcam inside the building’s famous dome.

The live link-up will give a behind the scenes glimpse of the multi-million pound renovation work going on inside the landmark city centre building.

The site has been stripped of some one million books and closed to the public during a three-year building project. But testing has started on a camera that could be fitted inside the dome of the Reading Room – the library’s most famous feature – to allow visitors to enjoy a bird’s eye view of what is going on inside.

It is expected that images from the camera would be streamed on to the council’s website.

A town hall spokesman said it was an idea that was being explored by officers but was still in the early stages.

The city’s huge collection of books were sent into underground storage in the Cheshire salt mines last year to allow workmen to start on site. The salt mines are thought to offer the best atmosphere in which to preserve the manuscripts.

The redevelopment will see the 60m diameter Shakespeare Hall on the ground floor, currently closed to the public beyond the front entrance, opened as a ‘centre of excellence for archive storage’ and the book storage ‘stacks’ replaced with exhibition space, a café, research and computer space and an amphitheatre-style performance area for readings.

Webcam viewers will also see the floor of the domed Reading Room removed while work takes place, with an exact replica rebuilt afterwards.

The refurbishment of Vincent Harris’s circular building, completed in 1934, is part of the wider modernisation of the Town Hall complex and St Peter’s Square. Facilities will be brought up to date and the buildings’ listed features restored to their former glory.

As the M.E.N reported last month, the city’s famous Rates Hall will be among the architectural treasures opened to the public again following the work.

The stunning 200ft-long hall, which runs the length of the town hall extension and was historically where residents went to pay their taxes, will become a ‘one-stop shop’ for town hall services.

Library launches "Europe's oldest book" appeal

LONDON (Reuters) - The British Library has launched an appeal to help it buy the oldest book in Europe, an "almost miraculous" survival from the Anglo Saxon period over 1,000 years ago.

The small volume was buried with one of England's most popular saints, Saint Cuthbert at a time when the country was being swept by continental invasions following the departure of the Romans, and despite its age is still in perfect condition with its original leather cover.

The Library is now just 2.75 million pounds from its target of 9 million pounds to buy the Cuthbert Gospel.

The book was loaned to the library in 1979 and has stayed there ever since but if the bid is successful it will stay there permanently.

It has also been agreed that if the gospel is purchased, it will spend half the year at Durham Cathedral, where the saint is buried.

St Cuthbert, also known as the "wonder worker of Britain," died in AD 687 and was buried on the Northumbrian island of Lindisfarne. He was widely regarded as Britain's most popular saint up until the murder of Thomas Becket in Canterbury Cathedral in 1170.

When Viking raiders invaded Lindisfarne in 875, a group of monks fled, taking Cuthbert's body with them. After seven years of travelling with the body, the monks finally buried the saint again at what became Durham Cathedral.

The book was found with him when his coffin was reopened in 1104.

The book, written in Latin, is the Gospel of John. After it was taken from the coffin it was placed in a new shrine behind the altar of Durham Cathedral.

After the Dissolution of the Monasteries in England by Henry VIII in the 16th century, the text passed to a series of private collectors.

Chief Executive of the Library, Dame Lynne Brindley, said in a statement: "The St Cuthbert Gospel is an almost miraculous survival from the Anglo-Saxon period, a beautifully preserved window into a rich, sophisticated culture that flourished some four centuries before the Norman Conquest.

(Reporting by Sam Watts; Editing by Steve Addison)

Kanazawa Umimirai Library by Coelacanth K&H Architects

"Reading – for the sake of knowledge or enjoyment, or to explore the world of the human imagination – is one of those experiences that gives you a sense of emotional and spiritual richness quite different from economic or monetary well-being. In this sense, the act of creating a space that surrounds you with books is undoubtedly linked to the creation of a new, enriched sense of public values...

...This library consists of a single quiet and tranquil room that resembles a forest, filled with soft light and a feeling of openness reminiscent of the outdoors. "

Full story: link

Photography by Satoshi Asakawa.

Global Communication & Ken Hollings At The British Library

Link: British Library events / Link: The Wire


As part of the British Library’s Out Of This World exhibition, regular Wire contributor Ken Hollings will be performing with the Radio Science Orchestra, on a bill alongside Global Communication (Mark Pritchard and Tom Middleton).

The Radio Science Orchestra is led by writer and producer Bruce Woolley, and deals in bringing vintage electronics together with conventional orchestral instruments. Also on the bill are Global Communication, playing live for the first time in 15 years, recreating their 1994 LP 76:14, plus DJ sets from Jon Hopkins and Rob Da Bank. Attendees are encouraged to dress in "sci-fi glamour", or at the very least, in something silver. London British Library, 17 June, 7:30–11pm, £12.50.

Rem Koolhaas' Seattle Public Library with graphics by Bruce Mau

Full story: Link

Central Station book

It looks really nice, doesn't it?

Noise book (update)

Just had word that my proposal for a chapter in the publication prompted by the Bigger Than Words conference was successful. So that's something to look forward to in 2011.

It will be amazing that this work will actually culminate in something in a book that ends up in a library.

Presentation board #3

Reworked library recordings

Above is the reworked version of the library noise. I also used the 3D Max output to cobble together some visual accompaniment.

Downloading British Library audio

Following a trip to Ratchford to pick up some book making equipment, I've downloaded the audio recorded at the British Library. Next I'm going to import the wav files into Acid and edit them down so that they become the final tracks. I've also decided that the tracks won't have titles but be identified by their running time. This is a reference to John Cage's silent composition known as 4'33" - although my recordings are far from silent. Some are pretty chaotic actually.

Stadsbiblioteket in Malmo

Another day, another country and yet another library. This one was just a short train journey from Copenhagen in Malmo, Sweden. Again, it was a calming space despite [because of?] its cathedral-like proportions.

One especially nice aspect of the architecture was the small study booths almost assembled like book cases along one side where people worked in relative seclusion whilst stacked up - three units high. Another clever addition was the checking in system which takes the books on a conveyor belt to be put back on display. To get there they travel under the floor with the publications visibly moving through the building under a glass panel.

We also got the wrong train on the way back. We mixed up 'Helsingor' and 'Helsingborg' and, instead of heading back to Denmark, we got to see some very grey Swedish countryside.

The Black Diamond

I'm in Copenhagen for the weekend so thought that I should check out the city's landmark Black Diamond: a bold extension to Denmark's Royal Library.

It is a great building and one that - even despite its cavernous, semi-industrial interior - feels particularly serene. Maybe the Danes are better behaved but it also seemed to be less noisy than some of the other libraries I've been investigating in the UK. Also being a design-conscious, cultural nation, the elegant gift shop was stocked with a selection of beautiful but sometimes weighty publications devoted to such subjects as furniture design, typography, interiors, architecture and music [the Black Diamond also hosts performances]. It's just a shame that everything is so expensive here.

However it wasn't the favourite location that I experienced yesterday. That honour has to go to Arne Jacobsen's Nationalbank headquarters with its breath-takingly modernist - yet proportionally almost ecclesiastic - foyer. With the current British Library-linked project for the 3Dmax class, I have actually turned my attention to staircases [sort of considering them as metaphors for how sound moves spatially through an environment] so this one located, within an almost silent space, proved interesting. Lovely use of text on the outside too.

British Library photos

British Library project

As mentioned in the previous post, this project has moved on from being one primarily concerned with comparisons between the noise in different libraries and has become one about documenting how it occurs within a specific space. As yesterday's visit might suggest, I've opted for the British Library.

The British Library is iconic given the fact that it is required by law to carry a copy of every book that is produced in the United Kingdom. And, while its architecture divides opinion, I felt it was an interesting environment.

What especially interests me is the balance between this very weighty tradition and the more abstract aspects of the building. Located somewhere between these two elements is this thing called noise. As discussed in last week's group tutorial, I want to [half-jokingly and half-seriously] create something that reflects how the sounds of the British Library have a quality that carries the essence of all this information and intellectual endeavour. I mean, the amount of people who go to study there suggest that the environment has more than wi-fi when it comes to that ability to inspire. So in terms of deliverables, this has become about the ability to commodify this essence: maybe in the way that, say, "Holy Water" is bottled at Lourdes.

So now I'm developing the idea of selling the sounds of the British Library as a package. Something that can be perceived as a potent study aid or an 'environment enhancer' that may suddenly turn your Jackie Collins paperbacks into weighty tomes. Perhaps while instantly increasing your IQ. But then also something that is more of a curio: a novelty gift if we have our tongue firmly in our cheeks.

Above is a quick interpretation of how it could be packaged using one of the photos I took yesterday. It also uses the design layouts that are used in existing British Library material. The plan is to produce it alongside some kind of print product that will explain more about the environment, the British Library's work and the sounds that were recorded.

Interestingly, they already sell CDs of birdsong and rainforest sounds in the British Library's gift shop.

Visit to the British Library

I took a trip to the British Library today and hopefully got everything I needed. I recorded some of the sounds around the building and took plenty of photographs.

Although while I was there, I felt myself more attracted to the architecture of the place rather than the books. The recordings also seem to be noisier than I had expected although that might be because I am studying this perceived "silence". Subsequently the (fuzzy) image that I had in my head about what this project might look like has disappeared.

I also paid particular attention to the gift shop given that the focus of this project is now to use silence as a commodity and specific environments as a sign of quality to create a marketable product. More on that all later once I've had time to digest and post the material that I collected today. Plus the train journey helped me get on top of my reading while I managed to attack a chunk of the report too. On reflection, it wasn't a bad day at all.

(The above image, by the way, is today's checklist.)

Toulon books

Another short, quick experiment which looks at the potential to use the colours from library book spines as markers for noise. There would be a requirement for the assignment of a colour to particular tones [perhaps with more or less vibrant hues representing the pitch of the sound] and then editing it to the audio track: maybe producing something that is choppier and far less gradual than the above trial. The inspiration for this visualization was disco lights.

Reply from The British Library #2

Via email:

"Dear Daniel,

As long as it is a hand held camera with no additional equipment, that should be fine and will not require supervision. It will also be fine to record background noise but not any individual conversations, etc.

Hope that helps.

Best wishes,
Chloé"

So that's that sorted. I just need to find a suitable time to head down to London and get what I need.