Ningbo Library is a public library located in Ningbo, Zhejiang Province, China. It is under the jurisdiction of the Ningbo Municipal People's Government, under the administration of the Ningbo Municipal Bureau of Culture, Radio, Television, and Tourism, and is a legal entity established by the Ningbo Municipal Government as a public welfare institution. As the center of Ningbo's public library service system, Ningbo Library not only has paper and electronic books, journals, and newspapers but also has a wide range of collections such as handwritten books, calligraphy, picture albums, photos, music, film, and television materials. Among them, the library has collected the writings of famous Ningbo people as well as Ningbo local newspapers and magazines in the work of preserving in situ cultural relics, which is the characteristic collection of the library. Based on the above-mentioned collection, the library has conducted research on literature resources in Ningbo and surrounding areas. By the end of 2020, the library had a collection of 3.1 million paper books (including nearly 80000 ancient books), over 3.6 million electronic books, and 15000 electronic journals.
Ningbo Library is a national first-class library accredited by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism. Formerly known as Ningbo Municipal Library, which was opened in September 1927. After several restructuring and relocations, it now operates two main buildings. Located at 135 Yongfeng Road, Haishu District, Ningbo. Yongfeng Hall (the old hall) was built with funds donated by Yue-Kong Pao and opened on May 1, 1989. The new building, located at 2100 Ningpen Road, Yinzhou District, is located in Ningbo East New Town and was designed by Danish SHL Architects and opened on December 28, 2018.
History
Before the establishment of the People's Republic of China In 1884, Xue Fucheng, one of the leaders of the Qing Guangxu Movement and the Self-Strengthening Movement, built the Kōraku-en (now located in Zhongshan Park, Ningbo) on the basis of Duxiu Mountain to the west of the Taoist Office. The Kōraku-en was built to provide a place for educating people, enlightening their minds, and providing space for the scholars to study, with a collection of books in the Lanxiu Hall. In 1894, Wu Yinsun succeeded Ning Shaobing as a reserve Taoist, renaming the collection of books of Lanxiu Hall Library to the Chongshi Academy Library, and increasing the library's collection by 1535 through book purchases and donations. In 1905, Chongshi Academy became the Ningbo Education Association. In 1913, the guilds of the six counties under Ningbo Prefecture built three western-style buildings in Kōraku-en, where all the books of Xue Fucheng, Wu Yinsun, and later additions were hidden, and the three library buildings were named "Xue Lou". During this period, with the increasing demand for knowledge, society spontaneously formed libraries with equal and open nature, such as the Siming Society Library, Siming Youth Library, Ningbo Youth Library, Youth Association Library, and Popular Library.
In 1926, the Siming Society Library, Ningbo Youth Library, and Popular Library held a joint meeting in Kōraku-en to discuss the establishment of the Ningbo Public Library. In 1927, after the victory of the National Revolutionary Army's Northern Expedition, Ningbo was established as a city. In May, Ningbo Mayor Luo Huiqiao decided to convert Xue Lou into the Ningbo Municipal Library. The Ningbo Municipal Library officially opened in September, with Zhang Ruzhao as its first director. The library becomes the first real public library in the history of Ningbo and the predecessor of Ningbo Library. In 1931, the establishment of Ningbo City was abolished, and the Ningbo Municipal Library merged with the Yinxian County Library. The library was renamed the Yin County Library. In 1932, due to the narrow building, under the negotiation of the Ningbo Education Association and Ningbo Chamber of Commerce, the library exchanged places with the National Goods Exhibition Hall and moved to Fuxian Street (today's Fuxiao Street). After the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937, the library moved back to its original location in Zhongshan Park.
After the establishment of the People's Republic of China After the People's Liberation Army conquered Ningbo on May 25, 1949, the Ningbo Municipal Military Control Commission was established. The Ministry of Culture and Education of the Military Control Commission took over the Yinxian County Library in June. At the time of the takeover, there were more than 15000 books in the collection, about half of which were ancient books. The collection of books was organized by the Ningbo Municipal Bureau of Culture and Education. The available books were transferred to the reading room of Ningbo People's Cultural Center, and the ancient books were moved to the Tianyi Ge Antiquities Exhibition Hall. The book and newspaper reading room of Ningbo People's Cultural Hall inherited the functions of the Ningbo Public Library during this period.
In 1953, Ningbo City Library was re-established at the old site of Zhongshan Park, with an area of 660 square meters and a collection of 8946 books. Most of the books in the collection are from the former Yinxian County Library, which was transferred back to the reading room of the People's Cultural Center. On September 9, 1962, the library was relocated to the former site of Santa Casa da Misericórdia in Sangyuan Lane, Yaoxing Street, Haishu District (119 Yaoxing Street). After the relocation, the area of the library was expanded to 1400 square meters, with a collection and editing room, a lending place, an ancient book department, a children's reading room, and a circulation guidance group. As of the Cultural Revolution, the library had a total of 159249 books, including approximately 73000 ancient books. After the start of the Cultural Revolution, in October 1969, the library was occupied as a "May Seventh Cadre School" in the city's cultural system, and the library was subsequently closed. On February 21, 1970, the establishment of the Ningbo Municipal Library was abolished and merged with the Ningbo Municipal Cultural Administration Commission to form the Ningbo Library and Cultural Heritage Museum. After the end of the Cultural Revolution, the Ningbo Library resumed its establishment in 1978.
In November 1988, the Ningbo Library moved to the new site of Yongfeng Road, which was donated and built by Yue-Kong Pao, a resident of Ningbo and the world ship king. The new site faces Yaojiang and has a building area of 8187 square meters. The new site of Yongfeng Road officially opened to the public on May 1, 1989. In 2001, the Ningbo Municipal Government invested in the expansion and renovation of the library, and the total area of the city's library buildings reached the current 12000 square meters. At that time, there were more than ten service windows, including book lending rooms, children's lending rooms, newspaper reading rooms, ancient local literature reading rooms, Tianyi Music Hall, foreign language reading rooms, and departments such as the editorial department, tutoring department, technical department, and office. In 2013, the Ningbo Municipal Government proposed in the minutes of the special meeting to build a new library building in Ningbo East New Town. The new building was completed and partially opened in November 2018, and opened on December 28. The library also designed a new library logo by taking advantage of the opportunity of the new library's building and renamed it Ningbo Library from Ningbo City Library.Letter on agreeing to the name change of Ningbo City Library and adjusting the institutional establishment matters (Ningbo Compilation Office Letter No. 69). Office of the Establishment Committee of the CPC Ningbo Municipal Committee. 2019-08-12 After the new building was put into use, it assumed the central function of the Ningbo Public Library service system.
Buildings Ningbo Library now operates two main buildings, one on Yongfeng Road, which was donated by Bao Yugang and opened in 1989, and a new building in Ningbo East New Town, which was opened in 2018.
Yongfeng Building The Yongfeng building of Ningbo Library is located at 135 Yongfeng Road, Haishu District. It is named Yue-Kong Pao Library in honor of Yue-Kong Pao, a famous Ningbo resident who donated HK$5 million to build the building. The name is no longer in official reports, but it has never been explicitly discontinued. The building was built in 1988 and opened on May 1, 1989, with a construction area of 8187 square meters, consisting of a five-story library, a four-story reading building, a three-story multifunctional hall, and a two-story entrance hall. The library building is 1508 square meters, the reading building is 1600 square meters, the multifunctional hall building is 1100 square meters, and the entrance hall building is 516 square meters. After completion, the computer network and other equipment as firefighting and electrical facilities in the building have been upgraded or added successively.
In 2001, the Ningbo Municipal Government invested over 20 million yuan to further expand the library on a large scale. Currently, the total building area of the library has reached 15368 square meters. Among them, there are 7,067 square meters of reader's lending room, 4,140 square meters of bookstore, and 825 square meters of lecture hall and meeting room.
New Building The new building of Ningbo Library is located in Ningbo East New Town, adjacent to the Ningbo Municipal Government and Ningbo Administrative Service Center. The construction of the new library began on August 17, 2015, and the main body was completed at the end of 2016. It was officially completed and accepted on November 30, 2018, and opened on December 28, 2018.
In 2013, the minutes of the special meeting of the Ningbo Municipal Government proposed the construction of a new building for the Ningbo Library in Ningbo East New Town. In the international invitation competition for the conceptual design of the new building of Ningbo Library held that year, the Shanghai office of SHL Architects in Denmark won the top spot among the plans of four Chinese companies and two foreign companies. The office has also provided design services for many libraries, such as the East Hall of Shanghai Library, the New Hall of Shanghai Children's Library, as well as Ningbo Daily Newspaper Group Headquarters, which is also located in Ningbo East New Town. The new building was awarded the 2020 Qianjiang Cup Quality Engineering Award for the construction project in Zhejiang Province.
The construction investment for the new building is about 249 million yuan. The building is a box structure with five floors, including one underground floor and four above-ground floors. The building area reaches 31405 square meters and the height is about 24 meters. The building is centered around the atrium and leads up through the central corridor to three huge open layout spaces, connecting the three buildings in the east, west, and south. The new pavilion widely adopts green building technologies, including passive energy conservation through measures and technologies such as using natural light to help improve indoor lighting, using an atrium structure to achieve excellent natural ventilation, and using Béton brut materials to help maintain the building's temperature in summer and winter.