Hidden Library : The Library in daily life

Public Libraries in contemporary enter into a relation diverse and complex role for public users. It can be a source of knowledge, a relaxing coffee shop, a warm living room and playgrounds for children. Library should give us a natural “Daily Encounter” as it is a medium that connects individual, community, city, society and culture. Through “Hidden Library” placed in the artificial Songdo cityscape, we created a continuous urban landscape and planned a space where nature and the library coexist. Libraries in urban centers should be accessible and open to all as it has a strong feature of public space. On top of that, it should provide not only knowledge and information but also a shelter and a green, relaxing space as it is an “Oasis of Knowledge” in the center of the city. The design of void library, which will make the space open and accessible, will encourage people and the space to have communication of knowledge and communication of everyday life.

The form of the new library of Songdo was approached by planning the landscape connecting from the site naturally. The roof of the library linked to the buff green is providing a library in the park which will give a sense of “Promenade of everyday life”. The mass composition with a gentle slope revealing the minimal form allows pedestrians to experience urban accessibility and escape the authoritative library
type. For the reading room in the promenade, the layout of the building was connected with the buffer green area to complete the axis of Songdo’s green-network, and the front was integrated into an open green area connected to the public office. A space where you can see the panoramic view of the golf zone and the horizon of the west sea was planned through the landscape roof above the reading room. The Landscape Library, which is a part of the park, is integrated into a hidden library in everyday life, while at the same time showing a spatial composition in which knowledge and community are connected as one.

The main reading room on the first floor was designed in a circulation type bookshelf with a large hall in the center. Visitors can experience the coexistence of light falling through the open library in the inner courtyard and the landscape roof. They can freely take out books at “The Book Hall”, looking at each other in a staircase space immersed in the center of the library, and sharing their daily lives. The circular corridor and the stepped bookshelf going down to the underground courtyard give the illusion of walking on a daily promenade. A huge bookshelf is installed on the walls of all reading rooms, and various books can be arranged along both sides of the wall. The contrast between the hidden landscape roof and the space in the transparent curtain wall becomes a new urban icon in the middle of Songdo’s artificial buildings.