National Library of Ireland Unveils New Offsite Book Storage Facility

From The Irish Times:

The National Library of Ireland (NLI) has unveiled a new book repository with state of the art safety features following devastating fires at cultural institutions such as the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris and the National Museum of Brazil in recent years.

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The new repository comprises 4,700 linear metres of storage. The project involved moving 350,000 volumes from five floors of storage in the Victorian west wing of the building into new onsite storage and high-quality offsite storage.

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From the National Library of Ireland

Funding of €1.6 million was made available for this phase one of development by the Department of Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht in 2017.  The work has been delivered collaboratively by the National Library, the Office of Public Works, and the Department of Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht.

Director of the National Library, Dr Sandra Collins said: “The completion of this phase of the Library’s capital development project is a huge milestone.  The new book repository gives us the great relief of having safeguarded the national published collections, bringing them from poor conditions into modern, safe storage.

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The €14.7million National Library of Ireland capital development plan will continue to 2021, under the €23million NLI capital commitment as part of Project Ireland 2040.  The coming phases will include investigative works in the Library’s West Wing, an application for planning permission, and the development of new public spaces and services, as well as ensuring universal access for all visitors. The NLI will remain open throughout, minimising disruption to its services for readers and visitors. The collection care carried out through 2017 – 2019 was facilitated by a temporary closure of the reading rooms on Mondays. This service will be restored from Monday, 30th September.

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Filed under: Funding, Libraries, National Libraries, News, Open Access