The Qatar National Library in Doha officially opened its doors on April         16th. Designed by OMA, the new building encompasses the National Library, the Public Library, the University Library, and the Heritage Collection, which consists of valuable texts and manuscripts related to the Arab-Islamic civilization.

At 42,000 square meters, the library is conceived as a single room which houses both people and books.“We designed the space so you can see all the books in a panorama" said Rem Koolhaas. "You emerge immediately surrounded by literally every book – all physically present, visible, and accessible, without any particular effort. The interior is so large it’s on an almost urban scale: it could contain an entire population, and also an entire population of books.”

According to the firm, the edges of the building are lifted from the ground allowing the visitor to enter the space at its center. The aisles are designed as a topography of shelving, interspersed with spaces for reading, socializing and browsing. The bookshelves, made of the same white marble as the floors, are also part of the building's infrastructure and incorporate artificial lighting, ventilation, and the the book return system. 

The heritage collection is placed at the center of the library in a six-meter-deep excavated-like space, cladded in beige travertine. "We paid tribute to the region’s rich culture with the Heritage Library, excavated from the ground like an archeological site, holding historical and priceless Islamic texts for visitors to study and contemplate" said Ellen van Loon.

This is the third library to be completed by the firm, following the Seattle Central Library in the US and the Bibliothèque Alexis de Tocqueville in Caen, France.