R & D

The art historian Aby Warburg designed a library next to his home in Hamburg that included a reading room with mezzanine and a loose thematic taxonomy of its books into:

• Image (art history, archaeology and early cultures)
• Word (mainly ancient and post-medieval literature)
• Orientation (philosophy, religious studies, history of science)
• Action (history, social history, history of festivals, theatre and technology)

“Because libraries have always been a part of any civilization they are not negotiable. They are part of our inheritance.”

Pat Hunter quoted in Ali Smith, “Public Library and Other Stories”

“The sunset colours of a civilisation are the most lovely”
John Strachey