MABIC - MARANELLO BIBLIOTECA CULTURA / New Town Library in Maranello

The new library in Maranello began to take shape in 2007, when the Municipality of this small town in Northern Italy announced the open design competition “Progettare la Cultura” (“Designing Culture”) that received nearly 150 submissions from Italy andabroad. The winning architects, Arata Isozaki and Andrea Maffei, received the commission to design the library in June 2008; construction began in September 2009. From the beginning, the project took into account aspects of sustainability, control over the environmental impact of the building and the reduction of fuel consumption. The architects stated that “the Municipality’s intention to offer a new service to the city could only take the form of a building that looked into the future”. The building defines a rarefied space that is perfectly placed within the urban fabric. Its sinuous profiles are bound by glass plates that follow its contour: reading becomes an “open” experience by means of the transparent membrane that forms the façade. It manifests as an interaction between knowledge and the contemplation of the landscape that surrounds the library. The new Library in Maranello offers the community an environment in which to read, study, learn and enjoy a space that is suspended over a body of water and enveloped by greenery.