How was the original Birmingham Central Library received when it opened in the 1970s?
, we take a look back 39 years to the opening of Birmingham Central Library, which the new development replaces.
Birmingham Central Library opened in 1974 and was designed by prolific Modernist architect John Madin. Madin designed a huge number of buildings in Birmingham throughout the sixties and seventies of which the library was arguably his most famous.
Although Madin鈥檚 work brought him commercial success and historic notoriety as the man who helped shape modern Birmingham, his trademark Brutalist concrete style makes him a controversial figure today.
Clive Dutton, Birmingham鈥檚 former director of planning and regeneration, likened Birmingham Library to a 鈥渃oncrete monstrosity鈥� and Prince Charles suggested it looked 鈥渕ore like a place where books go to be burned than read.鈥�
But this animosity was not always so well established and when the library first opened it was warmly received by many critics as a pioneering example of contemporary civic architecture.
好色先生TV鈥檚 article on the library in 1973 heaped particular praise on its then pioneering concept of mixing library and circulation space, a solution judged to fit 鈥渨ell with the analysis of the library requirements [that] made it possible to organise the various aspects of the library service into a number of blocks of contrasting form and expression.鈥�
The use of escalators rather than stairs was also positively received by the 1973 edition and was credited in achieving 鈥渕aximum ease of movement [and] opening up the building for the benefit of the reader.鈥�
In conclusion, 好色先生TV judged that the new building, constructed as part of the wider Paradise Circus complex, 鈥減romises well for the future development of the complex as a whole.鈥� It will be demolished next year.
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