As the days are warming up, I am already thinking of the joys of summer reading….
I came across these fun photos of a one-day beach library in Australia. In 2010, to advertise its bookshelves, IKEA put 30 full bookshelves on Bondi Beach in Sydney.
Surfers and swimmers could exchange their own books or leave a donation to The Australian Literacy and Numeracy Foundation.
all photos by James D. Morgan/Rex Features
I wish my local beach had this!
reading interrupted. 
So clever.Does the gorgeous guy in the second picture come with the book?? 🙂 I believe our Florida beaches need to start this.
I’m sure he does… as long as you donate to The Australian Literacy and Numeracy Foundation 😉
How fabulous! We would need books protected with transparent coverings like the ones in libraries I think to help them survive the rain and dramatic weather. But I still would want this on our Scottish beaches.
Book coverings would definitely be needed, but how wonderful would that be? And the books could be themed! Either a collection of Scottish authors or sea themed perhaps…
I’m liking this very much! There would be no end to the different themes one could come up with. I am very familiar with our local branch of IKEA – I will have to go and have a chat with them….
Hahaha, you’ll have to let me know how it goes! If I see libraries on the beaches of Scotland next time I go, I’ll be sure to thank you 🙂
🙂
A great combination of “B”-s . . . Beach and books . . . Well, and boys . Haha:)
What else could one ask for in life? 🙂
Oh how inventive this is! I do like to read on a blanket at the beach 🙂
Isn’t this great, Christy? I wish more beaches had this!
Inventive, and some would have you believe the printed book is on the verge of extinction.
Thank goodness they aren’t!
When I saw these, I thought they were photoshopped. They don’t even look real! But how neat. This would be the best way to get me to a beach. 🙂
It does look a bit surreal, you are right. You don’t often see people in bathing suits in a library. Or with surfboards!
Que maravilha, Letizia! Felizmente esse sistema de troca de livros está difundindo-se bastante, é uma ótima forma de disseminar o conhecimento. Abraços, Jaime e Jana
Sim, eu desejo que cada praia teve!
Gorgeous pic – what fun, and what joie de vivre, – a wonderful idea… and very labour intensive, – knowing what it’s like to move that the books on all our house moves!
I hadn’t thought about that, Valerie, but you are so right, that must have taken a lot of work, putting all those books in the shelves (and they had to walk across the sand to do it which is always a little tricky even without a pile of books in your arms!
What a great idea! Very clever, Ikea 😀
It’s true, a fun idea!
Book exchanges are a wonderful way to recycle books and in Sydney, this is obviously where lots of people hang out with a book!
Yes, bringing the books to where people read the most – it’s a great idea!
I would be soooo surprised to see a library on the beach, but delighted! I wonder what kind of books they offer! Great thought! Beach reading!
I know, I love this idea too! I wonder what kind of books they filled the shelves with too!
A great idea! OZ does come up with some great ideas!
I keep finding great literary projects that originate in Australia – I have to go one of these days.
These pictures are great.
From what I can gather about you – you would never leave this beach!
You’re right (and I’m not even much of a beach person!) 🙂
Well, for me a book and a beach (and sedated kids) sounds pretty darn awesome.
Some great beach reads there. 🙂
I wish I could see the book titles even closer 🙂
I’m not a fan of beaches, though I would make an exception if full bookshelves were lying around! I’d worry about all the books getting wet or sandy though. D=
I think you’re like me, Zen, we would spend more time looking at and reading the books than looking at the water!
We’d need laminated books for the beaches here in Oregon. 🙂
Definitely! (The beaches in Oregon are so beautiful – lucky you for living there; it’s a lovely state.)
you did again! love this blog, I shared it with my FB friends and insisted they follow you! paz, Abby
😀 I love the ‘insisted’ part! You are always so sweet and encouraging.
This is fabulous! And then I thought: How are they going to get all the sand out of those books?
Hopefully it’s not too windy in Sydney? Or perhaps the sand adds to the charm? 🙂
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Reblogged this on thediscursivesubject and commented:
this is great!
Awesome. I would say that you could put a bookshelf anywhere for a book exchange and attract traffic. Books just have a natural draw.
So true. It’s fun to think of all the possibilities.
What a fabulous idea. Hope this catches on and we can find this in other locals as well. Great post.
Thanks – I hope it does too!
Oh I hope they do it again!!!
I hope it becomes a trend on all beaches too!
A book beach would be my kind of beach. V.
I think a lot of us bibliophiles would spend the day on the beach reading and never step into the water….
You’re my kind of girl!!
This is absolutely AMAZING! 🙂
Can you imagine how surprised the swimmers and surfers must have been to see the books there? What a wonderful surprise though! Thanks for commenting 🙂
How inventive, plenty of natural light to read by, just cover them before the rain,
Have you ever been to slab city? they have a borrow a book and return it.
It a old base that has been taken over by the campers,
if you ever watch the movie into the wild it shows some of it on their.
Happy Mothers Day
I hadn’t heard of it but just looked it up- how cool! Thanks for telling me about it!
Hope you had a good Mother’s Day weekend!
You also have a awesome mothers day
What a cool idea! we need more libraries, wherever we can get them
I love how unexpected this is too.
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Your style is so unique compared to other folks I have read stuff from.
I appreciate you for posting when you have the opportunity, Guess I will
just book mark this page.
Thank you so much!
I’m pretty sure I’d never leave a place like this! I hope you’ve found lots of great books for your summer reading list. I’ll be thinking of you reading out on the patio with the squirrels and chipmunks. I’ll be out on my porch, probably with the same kinds of visitors.
I’m reading a book by Lynn Cox, the long distance swimmer. I love her memoirs and reading about swimming in the summer makes sense, doesn’t it? Enjoy your reading out on the porch with the squirrels and chipmunks (and thank you for the tweet!).
In case you feel like reading more swimming themed books after that one, I just finished Swimming Lessons and loved it. It’s a novel so it’s not really about swimming but there are a few swimming scenes in there. Happy summer!
Who is it by? I saw a few books with this title on amazon so wanted to get the one you recommended!
Sorry I’m bad with remembering to include the author! It’s the one by Claire Fuller. I loved it mostly because of the beautiful writing style.
I will check it out, thank you 🙂