The Tours municipal library

The beautiful Art Nouveau building you see there, comfortably nestled facing the Loire River, is the Tours municipal library. Its remarkable architecture and history have earned it the status of a historical monument. Tours had an old library, whose collection consisted mainly of documents and books seized during the French Revolution. Unfortunately, it was destroyed in 1940, consumed by the flames of the fire triggered by German artillery shells. The historical collections of the library went up in smoke, but some precious documents and incunabula were saved. An incunabulum is simply a book dating from before 1501,that is, before movable type printing. The reconstruction of the neighborhood was decided after the war, entrusted to architect Pierre Patout, who also designed a new library. He chose the Art Deco style, which was all the rage at the time and of which he was one of the main leaders. Very active between the wars, he had designed several transatlantic liners at the time and drew inspiration from them for his work. This style is even called the “liner style,” very popular in the 1930s. Here, the library exhibits typical Art Deco characteristics, with the use of reinforced concrete and large windows, as well as geometric shapes, reminiscent of Cubism. Thanks to significant donors, the municipal library of Tours is now considered the hub of a network consisting of seven libraries, a media bus, and four documentation centers. We’ll now take a stroll around it and pass by its main entrance.