Studio Hinge has completed the Forest of Knowledge, a library in Mumbai for the Cricket Club of India, that sits beneath a tree-like canopy of latticed wood. According to the architects, the design for the new library at the Cricket Club of India, Mumbai was informed by research into what a library in our digital times can be. Conceived during the Covid lockdown, it goes beyond books to propose the library as a house of knowledge, providing opportunity for people to come together and learn. On a conceptual level, the design draws from nature, in particular the notion of sitting under a tree with a book, and also borrows heavily from the beautiful canopy formed by the ficus and gulmohur trees found in the adjacent street.

The Cricket Club of India is a venerable and exclusive members club from Bombay’s colonial past, with an understated Art Deco building from 1938 as its main pavilion overlooking a historic cricket stadium. Its library was proposed to be in a standalone shed with a yard, but was then relocated temporarily to the fourth floor of the admin building, which ended up becoming its permanent home. Whilst the architects were disappointed not to have had the scheme for the original location realized, the proposed landscaped gardens and outdoor reading areas stayed with them, to be reimagined in the new location.

The new space houses over 55,000 books including long-term storage for rare/undisplayed books. Space for admin and book sorting is screened off from the visitor area by a cylindrical pod bookcase that serves as the main reception. The design intent was two-fold: to make the connection to the original idea of reading outdoors and to bring people to the library and encourage them to spend more time in the space.

Existing concrete columns are reimagined as trees, with circular bookshelves in Western Hemlock, supported on arching branches which reference the geometry of the pavilion’s colonnade along the cricket ground. The branches are of 16mm thick timber clad over 20mm square hollow box sections in steel. These also serve as conduits, and along with paneling to the RCC beams, avoid the need for lowered ceilings. The branches intertwine overhead,forming intricately woven meshes below the beams, recreating the sense of walking under trees with dappled light filtering through canopies above. Custom terrazzo flooring tiles with chips of marble and green glass create abstract patterns of scattered leaves.

Around the central trees are freestanding bookshelves in circular hedge-like arrangements. Bibliophiles browse, thumbing books within the hedges, before heading to the easy chairs and sofa benches by the windows for longer reads. Previously, the temporary library had been grim, with no separate area for staff, long lightless corridors, and bookshelves stacked in front of windows blocking out light. This, coupled with shrinking attention spans and the fact that people increasingly read on devices rather than books, meant that fewer people than ever visited the space. Those that did came to issue or return books and rarely stayed to read.

India experienced one of the harshest and most sudden Covid lockdowns in the world. A lot of the design of the library was developed during this time, during which it was clear that people were yearning to meet and share ideas in person again more than ever. Studio Hinge convinced the club to repurpose the adjacent under-utilized Zumba studio as a space in which they proposed auxiliary programmes around the interests of someone who might visit a library. These included film screenings, book clubs, new book launches, author readings, and workshops for children and adults.

The redesign allows the space to revert back to a dance studio when needed, with engineered oak flooring, flush mirrored cupboards that house the books not on display, storage for stacking furniture, and a large screen TV, all under a ceiling of undulating timber slats that speak of dance whilst concealing MEP overhead. By providing a platform for activities that essentially bring people together, this additional space has proven the key to activating and revitalizing the library. For Studio Hinge, it has been insightful to conduct post-occupancy surveys and observe how the space is used, but more than anything the realization of their objective has been borne out not just by increased footfall, but by the many messages of appreciation they receive from members.

Care has been taken to ensure no bookshelf in the open space is taller than 1.2m. This allows maximum natural light to permeate and for most adults to have an unobstructed view whilst standing, while creating sheltered nooks to sit and read in. It also provides a very different perception of the space for children, from whose vantage the space between the circular bookshelves is playful, almost labyrinthine. Windows have been enlarged with a large proportion of them being kept openable. This achieves an increase in both natural light and ventilation across two facades, reducing the reliance of the library upon artificial light and mechanical ventilation. The enlarged windows face east and north, avoiding the harsh glare of the south west.

The principal material used for the library is timber, with the windows in yellow cedar and the furniture in western hemlock. According to the architects, a key challenge was to find native species which are sustainably harvested, and so the decision was made to use FSC timber. Initially, the architects proposed the use of Siberian birch plywood for internal applications, but this was vetoed by the client based on a previous experience they had had. From the point of view of recreating a forest on the fourth floor of an office building in a city, as well as the edge detail and the warmth that real wood brings, the architects are happier that this was built this in solid timber. The hope is that a project such as this can inspire more people in India and beyond to build using real wood.