Gleaming white, undulating walls filled with a million books turned out to be too good to be trueRemember that futuristic, white library in China that went viral on social media earlier this month?
Some of us shared the stories because it did indeed seem quite cool:
China’s Beautiful New Library Can Hold Over 1 Million New Books
World’s Coolest Library Opens in China and It’s Breathtaking
Well, it turns out to have been not quite as cool as it first appeared. Since then reports have circulated that many of those “books” were actually just images of books printed on the wall.
China's New Tianjin Binhai Library is Breathtaking—and Full of Fake Books — https://t.co/9ZTERYjAZz pic.twitter.com/Gx61lioRvM
— Mental Floss (@mental_floss) November 18, 2017
According to a report in South China Morning Post, Liu Xiufeng, the deputy director of Tianjin Binhai Library, said the plan for the library’s spectacular atrium was that it would be used for circulation, sitting, and reading and discussion – but not to store books. A number of actual, books do line the shelves, but according to the report, they will soon have to be removed.
“We can only use the hall for the purposes for which it has been approved, so we cannot use it as a place to put books,” Liu said.
The library does contain a collection of 200,000 actual books, however.
“We are very capable of offering real books, and most of the books are on the third floor,” Liu said.
