University project / Building typologies

City Library

Lückenfüller — Dortmund West

2024/25

Two volumes settle into a vacant plot in Dortmund’s perimeter block. A floor-to-ceiling bookshelf becomes thick enough to inhabit—at once archive, circulation, reading room and changing filter for daylight.

Tall library interior wrapped in bookshelves with sculptural stairs — The inhabitable bookshelf and central reading room

City Library light-filter concept with plans and sections — The inhabitable book wall as a changing light filter

An inhabitable book wall

Every book removed from the shelf opens a new line of sight. The façade is never static: occupation, knowledge and daylight continuously redraw it.

The smaller and larger volumes join the neighbouring buildings while preserving a distinct interior world shaped by books, filtered light and embedded places to read.

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