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Cécile Sune
Cécile Sune

Grande Bibliothèque in Montreal

July 10, 2014December 9, 2018
Front View of the Grande Bibliothèque
Front View of the Grande Bibliothèque

Last week, I was in Montreal for a few days, so I thought I would go see the Grande Bibliothèque. I had never been, and I must say I wasn’t disappointed!

The building alone is worth a visit. Built in 2005, the modern structure boasts huge windows and high ceilings. The combination of concrete, glass, copper and yellow birch makes for an impressive result. The library holds more than 4 million items spread on 6 levels. To give you an idea of how big the collection is, it occupies 80 kilometers (50 miles) of shelf space, more or less the distance from Toronto to Barrie. 70% of the collection is in French, and the rest is in English.

One of the reasons for the Grande Bibliothèque’s success is that it was built next to the Berri-UQAM subway station. It is also located right downtown, so it is very easy to access. In fact, around 55,000 people come to the Grande Bibliothèque each week, and in May 2014, the library reached 25 million visits since its opening. However, I must say that I wasn’t impressed by the neighborhood. I don’t know if this was because we went during the Jazz Festival, but the public park next to the library on Place Emilie-Gamelin was really dirty, with litter strewn everywhere. There were also a lot of homeless people around.

What I really liked about this library though was their children’s section with its interactive games, listening pods and reading nooks. In fact, my husband and my daughter spent most of their time there while I was looking around the building. When I came back, they were both curled up on blocks of foam, reading comics. So I ended up joining them, and we spent the rest of our Sunday morning there.

Have you visited the Grande Bibliothèque in Montreal? What were your impressions of it?

Grande Bibliothèque Entrance Hall
Grande Bibliothèque Entrance Hall
Grande Bibliothèque Levels
Grande Bibliothèque Levels
Grande Bibliothèque Wall Art
Grande Bibliothèque Wall Art
Grande Bibliothèque Reading Room
Grande Bibliothèque Reading Room
Grande Bibliothèque collectiongrande bibliothequelibrarymontreal

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Cecile

Cécile Sune was born in Lyon, France, and her obsession with books started when she was 14. Her grandparents had lent her Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell, and she spent part of the summer indoors reading. Needless to say, her tan didn't really improve that year! It was also around that time that Cécile fell in love with the English language. Several years later, in 1999, Cécile moved to Toronto, Canada, with her cat and 5 suitcases. Her love of reading greatly increased when she discovered that English books were much cheaper than French novels. In 2013, she decided to start a blog to share her passion. Cécile now lives in Ottawa, Canada, with her husband and their daughter, and works as a freelance translator (CS Revision).

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