Amsterdam Bibliotheek
Posted: July 26th, 2007 | Author: Bone | Filed under: , Photography |
I know this is a really random thing to post about, especially as I haven’t mentioned all the much stuff about Amsterdam yet, but I was really impressed by the giant library that we went into on Sunday afternoon whilst we were walking around the area between the Centraal Station and the NEMO science museum.
It just had a great feeling about the place, very light and airy, and unlike most libraries, I’d probably look forward to going there if I was a student. The picture above shows the central area where you took escalators to the various floors.
This pic shows the way that they signed out what was on each floor, simple, but still cool.
The main reason why we came into the library in the first place was because we hoped we could get nice and high to get a view out over the city, there was one more floor open to the public above where this photo was taken, but that was a cafe, so we didn’t go in.
There was also a cool theatre circular glass-walled theatre on the top floor that had this fantastic chandelier in it.
There was also these weird chairs on a few of the floors, they were a squishy foam and as you would imagine, rocked about quite a lot.
The above two pictures were taken on the CD and DVD floor, the lower picture shows the inside of the cylindrical CD storage area that you can see in the right of the upper photo. I guess you were meant to listen to CDs in the seating area (the lighting changed colour in there), although we were rather more inclined to take a nap.
Naturally, there were also lots of books in the library, housed in these rather Space Odyssey-esque white book shelves. They were lit up by alternating blue and orange LEDs, perhaps those colours are least likely to damage the books? Or perhaps they just thought it looked cool.
They also had loads of computers in there, with free internet, so I thought I’d do a bit of guerilla marketing when I was finished checking my mail I left it on HYA.
Don’t worry, I post pictures of clubs too!
Was no one playing the piano in the entrance area? I was blown away by this building (I’m studying architecture), it’s easily one of the best public buildings I’ve ever seen.
But sat in the entrance, opposite the reception desk, is a little old stand-up piano. Next to it is a sign (in Dutch) saying that if you’re relatively good on the piano, you’re invited to play it.
Not only is it a wonderful experience wandering around this stunning building while beautifully played music floats through it, but it’s also refreshing that you have a society there that trusts ordinary members of the public and doesn’t try to control so much. I’m sure one or two kids will knock out a couple of random notes to get attension, but being so close to the reception it won’t last long, and the pay off from that slight risk is a great thing. Here in the UK you’d sit in silence whilst a CCTV camera follows your every move…
Try eating at the cafeteria on top floor - fabulous, fresh, and affordable in this very expensive city! Try the nut-topped apple torte dessert for sure!