Perrine Ernest & Aline de Gottal

 

The National Library of Prague has to become a symbol of a nation which is rebuilding. Giving it a value of symbol is therefore important.

The site is very well situated: on one side in the neighborhood of the embassies and on the other side in a park overlooking the city.

So we adopted two systems of entry: a plaza allowing access to the library on the city side and an extension of the park over the building to create another green plan for the visitors.

This green plan guides the visitor along the principal axe of the site: the link between the street and the promenade. Along this axe, the courtyards appear and in the center of them, the towers are erected, holding sections the library opposed to the stockrooms which are underground.

The towers rationalize the complexity of the program: the underground stockrooms feed the entire functionality of the library, that’s where the towers take their roots. The middle level serves the public and then you have the towers.

The lower tower has all the offices and is smaller keeping a coherence with the embassies.
The tower with the national archives is the higher one, it presents itself as a safety box holding the valuables. She has a value of symbol.
The last tower holds all the functions of the library open to the public as the shelving, reading rooms, restaurant and literary cafe.

The verticality of the project, beside being functional, offers an exceptional view and allows to control the sunlight while keeping the facade homogenous.
The round openings offer specific views and create a special atmosphere inside. From the outside,

they form a very graphic composition like many other facades in the city.

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