Designed by: BOLLES+WILSON

City Library Münster was Bolles + Wilson's first major public commission. The complexities of the overall building form are derived from the internal organisation and from a careful re-constitution of the fragmented context. A new pedestrian street on the axis of the nearby Lamberti Church divides the not inconsiderable mass of the library. This fissure in the volume is closed with folded screens (copper outside, acoustically absorbing perforated wood panels within). A transparent entrance zone (café, newspaper salon) leads via an information supermarket to the main information desk on the connecting bridge. This is turn is adjacent to book stacks in the ship-like outer volume. The atmosphere is quiet, studious. Books line the outer curved wall, a dramatic stair leads down through a 22m void to the basement media library, which in turn connects to the courtyard facing the children's library and back up to the entrance zone (text from architect's website).

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