The Most Beautiful Libraries in America

The United States is home to thousands of public, private and university owned libraries and they’re each beautiful in their own way. We’ve drilled down of the best examples of great architectural styles, from neoclassical to brutalist. Let’s exploce The Most Beautiful Libraries in America below.

The Most Beautiful Libraries in America

Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library

The Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library is Yale University’s principal source of literary archives, early manuscripts and rare books, and it’s used by students and researchers around the world. This dramatic library is where Yale University keeps its rates and most precious reading material. Students and researchers can peruse priceless literary treasures like The Gutenburg Bibles and Audubon’s Birds of America. The architecture dazzles with plenty of geometric features, bronze and glass.
Designed by architect Gordon Bunshaft of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill with the goal of filtering daylight to protect the books, the building was completed in 1963 and constructed out of marble and granite sourced from Vermont. This unique geometric exterior stands in juxtaposition to the neoclassical and neogothic architecture in the university courtyard.

The Boston Public Library

Opened in 1854, this was the first free public library in America. It’s lost none of its grandeur over the years, with a breathtaking reading room, a lush central courtyard complete with fountains and stone arches and rooms adorned with towering frescoes.
The Boston Public Library, which opened in 1854, was the first free public library in the United States. Its design has evolved over the years, with architect Charles Follen McKim completing his palace for the people in the present Copley Square location in 1895, before architect Philip Johnson designed an addition in 1972. The library is considered an example of great American beaux-arts classicism and, indeed, it became a national historic landmark in 1986. Inside the building are murals, collections of rare books, prints, manuscripts and maps, as well as gallery space.

George Peabody Library

A division of the Johns Hopkins University, the George Peabody Library opened in 1878 as part of the Peabody Institute a free public library, with lecture series, music conservatory and art collection dedicated to the citizens of Baltimore.
The library was designed by local architect Edmund George Lind in collaboration with the institute’s first director, Dr Nathaniel H Morison and it’s widely known for its dramatic interior, characterized by soaring ceilings and five stories of intricate cast-iron balconies.

The Redwood Library and Athenaeum 

The Redwood Library and Athenaeum is the oldest community library in America that still operates out of its original building. It has required a membership fee since its founding in 1747, but continues to be one of the most charming places to curl up with a good book in Rhode Island. That is once of The Most Beautiful Libraries in America.

The Library of Congress – Washington D.C.

Libraries just don’t get more dazzling than this. The Library of Congress in Washington D.C. is the largest library in the world and is features architectural details that would be at home in any palace or cathedral. It is spread over three buildings on Capitol Hill, but visitors tend to gravitate towards the breathtaking Main Reading Room in the Thomas Jefferson Building. No round up of the most stunning libraries in the United States would be complete without the Library of Congress in Washington D.C.
The largest library in the world, the Library of Congress is housed in three buildings on Capitol Hill. The most famous structure is the Thomas Jefferson Building, which opened in 1897 and houses the iconic Main Reading Room. Inspired by the reading room at the British Museum Library, the domed Main Reading Room is the central access point for the Library’s collections and is open to any researcher 16 and older. Interested in seeing more of Washington D.C.’s beautiful libraries.

State Library of Iowa’s Law Library in Des Moines, Iowa

This library in Des Moines, Iowa, provides Iowa lawmakers, government employees, the Iowa legal community, and the general public access to 105,000 volumes of legal treatises on state, federal, regulatory, and case law.
Originally created thanks to an act of Congress in 1838, the law library’s collection moved from location to location until 1886 when it settled on the second floor of the State Capitol Building in Des Moines. The library’s grand hall is intricately decorated in the Victorian style, boasting painted ceilings, stained glass inserts, and book-lined alcoves forty five feet in height.