Reading Nooks

Some reading nooks are created to make use of dead space--in a bay window, a large foyer or on the landing of a staircase. Others are carved deliberately into the corner of a room. A comfortable chair and good natural or mood lighting are essential. Some folks like to have their books surrounding them, always an arm's length away. Others prefer little embellishment around them. The better to be submerged into the world of their novel. A blanket, candles, flowers or plant life are small additions that raise these small spaces from serving a purpose to inviting us for an extended visit. Some think an afternoon spent reading is a waste of time. My feeling is that time spent reading makes the rest of the day better spent.

Images: House Beautiful magazine, July/August 2010 issue. Marie Claire Idees magazine, January 2010 issue. Period Living magazine, October 2010 issue. Red magazine, November 2010 issue. She Moves the Furniture.

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Books Arranged by Color

Family and friends know that I have an obsessive compulsive streak, so the fact that I'm attracted to great walls of color-coordinated books is no surprise. Though I've dabbled in arranging my books by color, I've never had a library set-up with all of my books on display in one spot. I still remember driving to south Philly with my friend Liz one evening a few years ago and slowing down so we could get a better look at a red wallpapered library that called to us like a beacon from the third story of an elegant rowhome. A well stocked library will always get a second look from me.

One of the many highlights in Christian Slater's apartment in the movie Bed of Roses is his tidy wall of red and black books and the ladder that he uses to reach them and his rooftop garden (above). Though it takes some effort to achieve, a library that is arranged in blocks of color becomes an artful focal point. And anything that draws people to peruse a library and then curl up with a good book is more than worth the effort.

Images: New Line Cinema. House & Home magazine, September 2010 issue. Thrifty Chic: Interior Style on a Shoestring by Liz Bauwens and Alexandra Campbell, photography by Simon Brown, published by CICO Books 2009. Living etc magazine, May 2010 and June 2010 issues.

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Librophiliac: Libraries/ Bookstores

I am a confessed Librophiliac- below is my personal version of church, my favorite drug and a place that I can loose myself for hours if not days.  Between pages, I am transported.  Kindle and the technology of books in that way will never replace the smell of books, the feel of books or my love of books.  This to me is heaven.  I have spent my life mostly, "well read but sleepy."

Strahov Theological Hall - Original Baroque Cabinet

Strahov Theological Hall; Statue of John the Evangelist Holding a Book

Strahov Philosophical Hall

Abbey Library St. Gallen, Switzerland

Angelica Library, Rome, Italy

Herzog August Library, Wolfenbüttel, Germany

Beatus Rhenanus Library, Basel, Switzerland

Bernadotte Library, Stockholm Sweden

Biblioteca Angelica, Rome, Italy

Biblioteca Di Bella Arti, Milan, Italy

Biblioteca do Palacio e Convento de Mafra I, Lisbon Coast, Portugal

Biblioteca do Palàcio Nacional da Ajuda Lisboa III, Lisbon, Portugal

Biblioteca Geral University of Coimbra, Coimbra, Portugal

Biblioteca Palafoxiana, Puebla, Mexico

Bibliotecha de la Real Academia De La Lengua, Madrid, Spain

Bibliotheque Alencon, Normandy, France

Bibliothéque Nationale de France, Paris, France

Duke of Humphrey’s Library, Bodleian, Oxford University, England

Boston Copley Public Library, Boston, USA

Old British Reading Room, British Museum, London, England

Casanatense Library, Rome, Italy

Cathedral Library, Kalocsa, Hungary

Chetham’s Library, Manchester, UK

Dutch Royal Archives Library, Netherlands

El Escorial Library, San Lorenzo, Spain

Frederick Ferris Thompson Memorial Library, Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, New York, USA

George Peabody Library, Baltimore, Maryland, USA

Handelingenkamer Tweede Kamer Der Staten-Generaal Den Haag, the Hague, Netherlands

Hereford Cathedral Chained Library, Hereford, England (Rare books were once kept chained to the bookshelf to prevent stealing.)

Herzogin Anna Amalia Bibliothek Weimar II, Germany

Joanina LIbrary University of Coimbra, Portugal

Kremsmuenster Abbey Library, Kremsmünster, Upper Austria.

Biblioteca Castilla La Mancha, Spain

Library of Congress, Washington, DC, USA

Library of Parliament, Ottawa, Canada

Library of St. Walburga, Zutphen, Netherland (Preserved from the 16th century)

Library of the Benedictine Monastery of Admont, Austria

Library of the National Palace of Mafra, Portugal

Library of the Prussian King Frederic the Second in Potsdam, Germany

Melk Monastery Library, Melk, Austria

National Art Library, Victoria and Albert Museum, London

North Reading Room, UC Berkeley, California, USA (Terrific reader suggestion)

New York Public Library, New York, USA

Plantin-Moretus, Antwerp, Belgium

Queen’s College Library Oxford

Real Gabinete Portugues De Leitura Rio De Janeiro, Brazil (Possibly the most beautiful library of them all.)

Rennie Mackintosh Library, Glasgow School of Art, Scotland (Added on excellent reader suggestion.)

Riggs Library, Georgetown University, USA

Rijkmuseum Library, Amsterdam

Riksdagen Library, Swedish Parliament Library, Stockholm, Sweden

Russian National Library, St. Petersburg

St. Florian Monastery-Library, Austria

Salamanca Library, Salamanca, Spain

Sansovino Library, Rome, Italy

Sorbonne Library, Paris, France

State Library, Victoria, Australia

Stiftsbibliothek Klosterneuburg, Klosterneuburg, Austria

Suzzallo Library, Seattle, Washington, USA

The New Library of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh

Theology Room at St. Deiniol’s library, North Wales

Trinity College LIbrary, AKA, The Long Room, Dublin, Ireland

University-Library, Helsinki, Finland

Vatican Library, Vatican City, Rome

Austrian National Library, Vienna, Austria

Waldsassen Abbey Library, Bavaria, Germany

Wren Library, Trinity College, Cambridge, England

Yale, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, New Haven, Connecticut, USA

At the end of this post we at Curious Expeditions asked for beautiful libraries we had overlooked. Turns out, there were a lot. In fact, more than we will ever be able to post. But in the spirit of the compendium below we have put up some of our favorites from the reader suggested libraries. Thanks to everyone who suggested a library, it’s fantastic to see that we aren’t the only ones with a bad case of librophila. (We also apologize to anyone who suffers a scrolling related injury.)

Amelia S. Givin Library, Mount Holly Springs, PA

Bad Schussenried Bibliothekssaal, Baden-Württemberg, Germany

Biblioteca Medicea-Laurenziana, Florence, Italy

Bibliothèque Solvay, Brussels, Belgium

Boston Athenæum, Boston, MA, USA

Codrington Library, All Souls College, Oxford, England

Cornell Law School Library, Ithaca, NY, USA

Folger Shakespeare Library, Washington D.C., USA

George Vanderbilt’s Biltmore House Library, Asheville, N.C., USA

Harper Library, The University of Chicago, IL, USA

John Rylands Library, Manchester, England (Thanks to Edward Brownrigg and John Rylands)

Klementium Library, Prague, Czech Republic

Llyfrgell Genedlaethol Cymru, National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth, Wales

National Library of Ireland, Dublin, Ireland

Old Chicago Public Library (Current Cultural Center), Chicago, IL, USA

Pierpont Morgan Library, NY, NY, USA

Saxon State Library in Dresden, Germany (The reading room pictured is entirely underground, the ceiling being level with the grass.)

Sterling Memorial Library, Yale, New Haven, Connecticut, USA (The rest of Sterling Library is incredible, but I particularly enjoy that wonderful library specialty, the card catalog)

The Grolier Club Library, NY, NY, USA

Law Library, Iowa State Legislature, IA, USA

The St. Johnsbury Athenaeum, Northeast Vermont, USA

Thomas Crane Library, Quincy MA, USA

Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, Toronto, Canada

University of Michigan (Old) Law Library, MI, USA

Widener Library, Harvard. Cambridge, MA, USA

Wiblingen Monestary Library, Ulm, Germany

 

 Daunt Books on Marylebone High Street , London"

Jay Walker's library.  New England home and pass through a hallway into the bibliographic equivalent of a Disney ride. Stuffed with landmark tomes and eye-grabbing historical objects — on the walls, on tables, standing on the floor — the room occupies about 3,600 square feet on three mazelike levels. Is that a Sputnik? (Yes.) Hey, those books appear to be bound in rubies. (They are.) Gee, that chandelier looks like the one in the James Bond flick Die Another Day. (Because it is.) No matter where you turn in this ziggurat, another treasure beckons you — a 1665 Bills of Mortality chronicle of London (you can track plague fatalities by week), the instruction manual for the Saturn V rocket (which launched the Apollo 11 capsule to the moon), a framed napkin from 1943 on which Franklin D. Roosevelt outlined his plan to win World War II. In no time, your mind is stretched like hot taffy.

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