Bookstore and cafe blend with a library in Hangzhou, China

The new Yue Library in Hangzhou by Chinese firm Beijing Fenghemuchen Space Design has been featured on Designboom as a “shared space integrating systematic, diversified, and upgraded lifestyles of reading, coffee, and cultural interaction”.

The 10-metre-high space is conceived as a reading-themed living space and cafe, divided into horizontal layers forming natural wood platforms for activities. The design firm partnered with Beijing Capital Land in an exploration of Hangzhou’s culture to best serve local citizens in designing the new library space.

The Yue Library offers reading and book borrowing as well as a bookstore, literature and arts salon, movie concerts, and music festivals.

“Natural wood is a material filled with vitality, whose temperature and touch are quite similar to those of human beings,” said a spokesperson from the studio to Designboom. “By building and shaping the space with natural wood, a kind of resonance with the human body can be created … making it a soothing and relaxing retreat from urban pressure.

“Walking into this jungle of books, you can draw inspiration from a vast pool of wisdom.”

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