The Dutch ambassador to France hosted a dinner in Paris on Thursday evening to celebrate the new Alexis de Tocqueville library in Caen, designed by the Rotterdam-based architecture firm OMA and opening to the public on 14 January.
While the agency’s founder, Rem Koolhaas, hobnobbed with guests, OMA partner Chris van Duijn presented the project. He said this is the second library the firm has built (after the Seattle Central Library) but one of seven it has designed, counting competitions and the Qatar National Library, to be completed next year.
Each of these projects has been vastly different, and all have been important for the agency’s evolution. Van Duijn explained, 'Libraries are public institutions that must be adapted to how a society deals with culture, knowledge and art.'
The architects hope that this completion will mark the beginning of a larger transformation within Caen
In Caen, the 12,000 sq m multimedia library sits at the tip of a peninsula that leads to the English Channel, straddled between the historical centre and a newer area currently under construction. Much of the city was devastated in 1944 but some treasures survived, including two Romanesque abbeys founded by William the Conquerer.
The city’s brief originally requested four different poles for its collections (human sciences, science and technology, literature, the arts), all connected by pathways. OMA opted instead for a singular, large glass building shaped like an asymmetrical cross. Two branches point towards the 11th-century abbeys, while the other two point in the direction of the train station and the neighbourhood under development.
Each of the branches has distinct amenities, such as a curiosity cabinet for artefacts, or film projection rooms. A large void space carved out of the middle of the cross provides a reading room and 360-degree views of the city, some distorted by bulges in the glass.
Van Duijn also addressed the ever-looming question of whether it makes sense to build libraries when the future of books is uncertain. 'We are still optimistic about the social relevance of libraries,' he said, adding that this one is sure to be a 'significant institution in the daily life of Caen.'
The library's cross shape reflects its key location between the city’s historic core and an area of Caen that is currently being developed
The 12,000 sq m multimedia space will contain four distinct libraries (spanning human sciences, science and technology, literature, and arts), a reading room and different workspaces
INFORMATION
-
Vestre’s neo-brutalist furniture will bring ‘a little madness’ to Paris Fashion WeekBound for Paris Men’s Fashion Week this month, Norwegian furniture brand Vestre reveals a sculptural bench and mirror created with designer Vincent Laine and fashion creative Willy Cartier – the latest outcome of its risk-taking ‘a little madness’ initiative
-
For its latest runway show, Zegna creates a serene oasis in DubaiThe Italian fashion house took over the Dubai Opera for a S/S 2026 show that proposed a lived-in elegance, drawing inspiration from Dubai’s sunbaked landscapes and Zegna’s birthplace of Trivero
-
Time-travel to the golden age of the cruise ship at Sea Containers LondonThe South Bank hotel celebrates its tenth anniversary with four new suites inspired by period cabin design, from Edwardian elegance to 1980s glamour
-
A love letter to the panache and beauty of diagrams: OMA/AMO at the Prada Foundation in Venice‘Diagrams’, an exhibition by AMO/OMA, celebrates the powerful visual communication of data as a valuable tool of investigation; we toured the newly opened show in Venice’s Prada Foundation
-
Stay in a Parisian apartment which artfully balances minimalism and warmthTour this pied-a-terre in the 7th arrondissement, designed by Valeriane Lazard
-
Marta Pan and André Wogenscky's legacy is alive through their modernist home in FranceFondation Marta Pan – André Wogenscky: how a creative couple’s sculptural masterpiece in France keeps its authors’ legacy alive
-
NYC's The New Museum announces an OMA-designed extensionOMA partners including Rem Koolhas and Shohei Shigematsu are designing a new building for Manhattan's only dedicated contemporary art museum
-
Paris’ architecturally fascinating Villejuif-Gustave Roussy metro station is now openVillejuif-Gustave Roussy is part of the new Grand Paris Express, a transport network that will raise the architectural profile of the Paris suburbs
-
Turin’s Museo Egizio gets an OMA makeover for its bicentenaryThe Gallery of the Kings at Turin’s Museo Egizio has been inaugurated after being remodelled by OMA, in collaboration with Andrea Tabocchini Architecture
-
Explore wood architecture, Paris' new timber tower and how to make sustainable construction look ‘iconic’A new timber tower brings wood architecture into sharp focus in Paris and highlights ways to craft buildings that are both sustainable and look great: we spoke to project architects LAN, and explore the genre through further examples
-
A transformed chalet by Studio Razavi redesigns an existing structure into a well-crafted Alpine retreatThis overhauled chalet in the French Alps blends traditional forms with a highly bespoke interior
