Pop up and other non-traditional library practices

Its been ages since I have posted to this blog.  I think the rush to finish off the LMS project & then tidy up things late last year took the last of my "blog posting energy".  There have been a few things I could have / should have posted about.  And having had a discussion with a library manager last week, I'm committed to getting back in the groove & sharing things that are perhaps useful / interesting to our public library community.

This post actually is a pointer to another site which has some great information about pop-up culture generally & libraries feature quite a bit on their site!

There is a great 2013 article about a French pop-up library here. I'm sure we don't often think of France as having a big beach culture, so this is an interesting one.  I love the integration of the book area along with the provision of shaded areas for readers.  Most interesting.  And just for fun, the French architect's site has the most fascinating navigation mechanisms - that itself is worth looking at.

The Pop-Up City site also has a February article about Beijing's metro trains becoming e-book libraries. QR codes are placed in train carriages & these enable customers to download the available e-books. Maybe this is something for PLS to take up with Transport SA for our trains & buses.  You will also find a 2013 article about a Toronto neighbourhood tool library and a 2012 article on turning an abandoned Walmart store into America's largest single floor library (at over 11,500Sq M!).  If you're ever ventured into a Walmart store you'll know how utilitarian / ugly they are, so it is interesting to see that this library won an interior design award for the transformation it has done.

There is also an article about a "free library" in Tokyo's subway.  Effectively it is a book swapping idea - but great to see.  and it is interesting to see how the idea of "library" is morphing and being owned in the pop-up culture.

The site also has some revolutionary ways that vending machines are being used - much more nimbly than any of the so called library vending machines.

So if you're interested in rapidly changing use of public space & engagement with communities in novel ways, then go take a look at this site.  And if you're interested, they have a book about pop-up culture that you can buy for your collection!

And having re-booted the blogging part of my brain I'll fire off a few more posts in coming weeks - about some of our local projects and issues as well as other points of interest as we find them.