A domestic safe-haven within a developing cityscape

The main intentions of the library were to introduce a welcoming public space to an area dense with private land, recreate a public living room that users will feel comfortable taking ownership over, extend the Feeder Road high street while retaining access to the Propyard events space, and respond to the pitched warehouse form while keeping a domestic scale in an area soon to be filled with tower blocks.

The sustainability takes precedence in the library's design, with use of concrete’s thermal mass influencing every other aspect. Utilising the fluid properties of concrete to recreate domestic textures such as herringbone, lace, and timber panelling in a variety of colours gives the spaces a sense of individuality that can lead to users developing a sense of ownership over the library. The use of individual furnishings extends this effect, with varying atmospheres created in the different nook spaces formed between bookstacks. The strength of concrete allows windows to be punched where desired, with seating incorporated into the structure as a result. Informal, comfortable seating helps users relax and increases domesticity.

In the politics of space Bachelard discusses the importance of levels within the home, with the attic being a place of safety. The idea of the roof space of the library being inhabitable as a refuge, with visibly expressed structure as in Magdalene Library, is therefore key. Timber beams are not just visible in the roof, with studwork partitions dividing the open space further into “rooms”. Many images of the building are drawn in the style of De Chirico as he wanted “to look upon everything in the world as enigma… to live in the world as in an immense Museum of strange things”

I think the history of the area replicates De Chirico’s sentiments on viewing the world as a museum, and the domestic myth of the Terrace library sits it comfortably within that. The library exists as a domestically scaled piece of civic architecture among much larger private structures, that draws elements from surrounding typologies while creating its own character.