First enjoying viral success in 2018 with the opening of Biblioteka na Poziomie in Lublin, eastern Poland, the GK-Atelier studio found themselves immediately hailed as flagbearers for the future.
Decorated with mezzanine levels, soothing lighting, moss-clad walls and bursts of greenery, it was unlike anything Poland had seen before. Three years later, GK-Atelier returned to the spotlight with their Bioteka project, also in Lublin, a hair’s breadth of the city’s Saski Park.
“We wanted the interiors of the library to feel like a natural extension of the park; that’s why we used a lot of wood and greenery,” says Grzegorz Kłoda, the founder of GK-Atelier.
Costing 1.6 million złotys, this modest outlay saw a gloomy Communist-era eatery transformed into a modern cultural facility that earned GK-Atelier a slew of accolades, among them a win at the European Property Awards.
“Each of our projects is unique,” Kłoda tells TVP World. “We don’t care about trends; we’re more concerned to show that good design isn’t about budget but creativity.”
This affordability has enabled more provincial towns, such as Kraśnik in southeastern Poland, to embrace the vision of GK-Atelier—with striking effect.
Unveiled in 2023, Kraśnik’s Nowy Horyzont library could be mistaken for an Insta-friendly cocktail bar: powder pink swings hang suspended from the ceiling while blue neon signs wink from the walls.
Designing each of the three rooms to target different types of users—the introvert, the extrovert, and the classic in-betweener—the library has already become a steadfast hit with the locals.
“We wanted to show that good design shouldn’t just be limited to big cities and that the residents of smaller towns also deserved to enjoy good architecture,” says Kłoda. “We aim to showcase pro-social architecture that tightens the bonds of local communities.”
Specializing in non-standard solutions, Kłoda’s firm has also spread its wings to cover Poland’s larger conurbations. In Warsaw, for instance, autumn will see the debut of the Metroteka library inside the Kondratowicza metro station.
“In such a busy world, libraries need to reach out to the user and appear on their daily route,” says Kłoda. Through its subterranean location, hopes are high that Metroteka will naturally thrust itself into the conscience of passing commuters, and in this way encourage reading on public transport.
Providing additional inducement to step inside will be a sci-fi design filled with wavy, ribbon-like surfaces, as well as innovations such as automated book machines aimed at enticing those with little time.
However, it is not revolution that is necessarily the buzzword, but evolution. By also working with pre-existing libraries, Kłoda has made their upgrade look effortless.
Once gloomy and oppressive, Wrocław’s Lower Silesian Public Library has been handed a new lease of life with the addition of intriguing seating arrangements, pops of greenery and a loving facelift of its best-known feature—a surreal 1970s plafond painted by artist Anna Szpakowska-Kujawska.
It is, though, no surprise that the renovation of this standout work was given such prominence. Among Kłoda’s golden rules, the inclusion of local art comes close to the top: “Public libraries operate locally, and so their message should be understood locally,” he says.
“Their future activities need to support the development of their communities, which is why, for instance, in each new library we also include a gallery displaying the works of local artists.”
On a more pragmatic front, for GK-Atelier, modernizing spaces—or building anew—has not just been an exercise in frivolity. Soundproofed children’s zones and disabled-access are among their core considerations, and so too are environmental needs. As such, initiatives such as plant-swap exchanges for unwanted houseplants have thrived.
Critically, while Kłoda has made it his crusade to broaden the appeal of Poland’s libraries, this has not come at the cost of the library’s traditional function. Books rule the roost.
“If someone needs proof, then I just ask them to think about what kind of furniture we use most in our arrangements,” he says. “That’s bookcases, of course, which means that the book continues to be by far the most important ingredient in our libraries—all our projects can genuinely be called a ‘house of books’.”
This is more than just token lip service. “I believe that the two most important things in a library are the librarian and the book,” he says. “And despite people forecasting that, thanks to the development of technology and AI, that both books and librarians will be replaced by screens, I see a bright future.”
Kłoda adds: “Reading is experiencing a renaissance, and the profession of librarian is now being recognized as one of the world’s most creative professions. For me, the library will always be the home of the paper book, where the creative librarian, in human form, has his kingdom. The rest is just an add-on; sure, it’s important, but it’s an add-on all the same..."
