Looking like something out of a Kubrick film, the new Tianjin Binhai Library by MVRDV and local firm TUPDI features cascading floor-to-ceiling bookshelves that double as benches centered around a luminous sphere. From outside, the library has the appearance of a mysterious eye, with the layered interior elements acting as louvres for the facade. Gaze up at the walls from ground level and it seems like the books just keep going and going, all the way to the ceiling. The library contains an incredible 1.2 million books.

Designed and built in just three years, the Tianjin Binhai Library is located in the cultural center of Binhai district in the coastal city of Tianjin, outside of Beijing, China. It’s part of a complex of cultural buildings by prominent international architects, which are all connected by a glass canopy. The building has already become known locally as ‘The Eye.’

“The Tianjin Binhai Library interior is almost cave-like, a continuous bookshelf. Not being able to touch the building’s volume we ‘rolled’ the ball shaped auditorium demanded by the brief into the building and the building simply made space for it, as a ‘hug’ between media and knowledge” says Winy Maas, co-founder of MVRDV. “We opened the building by creating a beautiful public space inside; a new urban living room is its centre. The bookshelves are great spaces to sit and at the same time allow for access to the upper floors. The angles and curves are meant to stimulate different uses of the space, such as reading, walking, meeting and discussing. Together they form the ‘eye’ of the building: to see and be seen.”

Along the edges of the interior, beyond those undulating walls, various educational facilities can be found on five levels. A subterranean service space holds even more books as well as a large archive. Books for children and the elderly are located at the lowest levels, and while it may look like the bookshelves grow less and less accessible as they reach the ceiling, it’s an illusion: the books on the higher levels are actually painted onto the surface of the wall.

You might be wondering how in the world they’re going to keep this bright white space clean. The answer, apparently, is ropes and movable scaffolding. Sounds like a fun job.

Symmetrical photographs reveal the elegant geometries present in the architecture of some of the world’s most beautiful libraries, captured by Thibaud Poirier. The Paris-based photographer has traveled throughout Europe, visiting places like the Bibliotheque de la Sorbonne, the modern white Stadtbibliothek in Stuttgart, Dublin’s Trinity College Library and the church-like Biblioteca Angelica in Rome to highlight their classical beauty and make us all wish we were roaming around gazing at those rows of books right now.

“Like fingerprints, each architect crafted his vision for a new space for this sacred self-exploration,” says Poirier. “These seemingly minute details are everywhere, from the balance of natural and artificial light to optimize reading yet preserve ancient texts to the selective use of studying tables to either foster community or encourage lonely reflection. The selection of these libraries that span space, time, style and cultures were carefully selected for each one’s unique ambiance and architectural contribution.”

The photographer calls this library series ‘Palaces of Self-Discovery,’ noting that they provide the same kind of worship space and community interaction as a church, even while the act of reading is typically a solitary one. Within each of these buildings is countless opportunities to lose oneself in another place or time, take on another person’s identity and temporarily forget about all of our cares and worries.

The photos also offer something we couldn’t get from these libraries in real life: the chance to see them empty of people. Poirier seems to have gained permission to enter each library before or after opening hours to get his shots, further emphasizing the sense of solitary exploration. See the whole series at Thibaud Poirier’s website.

Peruse the waterproofed selections at Minnesota’s Floating Library, renew your library card at a bus stop in Bogota, or select a volume from the shelves mounted to a tank-shaped ‘Weapon of Mass Instruction.’ These 12 traveling libraries and pop-up book stands bring the love of reading to the city streets, and even to the most remote corners of Mongolia via camel.

Weapons of Mass Instruction Tank Library

Artist Raul Lemesoff was commissioned by 7UP to create ‘Weapons of Mass Instruction,’ a 1979 Ford Falcon transformed into a tank-shaped library, for World Book Day 2015. The vehicle features a rotating upper chamber, a faux cannon and room to store nearly 900 books in various compartments along the exterior. The library travels throughout Argentina, both urban and rural, to bring free books to anyone who wants them.

Mobile Beach Library in France

French architecture firm Matali Crasset brought more than 300 titles to becah goers in the seaside town of D’Istres via a pop-up library made of steel and tarps. The tent-like structure includes three shaded reading alcoves.

Bus Station Library

This urban book stand in Bogota, Colombia is part of the Paradero Para Libros Para Parques (PPP) program, created to promote literacy across the country. There are currently 47 of these bus stop libraries across Bogota, with many more located in other cities. A volunteer staffs each one for about 12 hours per week.

Pedal-Powered Mobile Library

The Denver Public Library literally brought its services to the streets in the form of DPL Connect, a pedal-powered mobile library and wi-fi hotspot that can travel to parks, concerts, farmer’s markets, coffee shops and anywhere else people gather. It’s stocked with a rotating collection of books tailored to the bike’s location, and the librarian pedaling the cart can provide traditional library services like help with digital downloads and reading suggestions.

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Pop Up Books 12 Mobile Libraries

Dark wood, dazzling details, leaded glass windows and tier after towering tier of books – classic historic libraries are a bibliophile’s dream. These 13 (more) libraries, dating from the 18th to the early 20th centuries, represent some of the most astonishingly beautiful book repositories ever built.

Rijksmuseum Reading Room, Amsterdam

(images via: rijksmuseum.nl)

The largest public art history research library in the Netherlands, the Rijksmuseum Reading Room was formerly located in the stunning main Rijksmuseum building, established in 1800. It has since been mod to a new, separate building, but images of its tiers of books in a massive historic room continue to dazzle.

Trinity College Library, Dublin, Ireland

(images via: irish welcome tours)

At Ireland’s oldest university, home to the book of Kells, the ‘Old Library’ stuns with its dark wood, spiral staircases and seemingly endless aisles of books. It was built between 1712 and 1732 and renovated in 1860 to include a barrel ceiling for a second floor of book shelves.

Canadian Library of Parliament

(images via: wikimedia commons)

Canada’s LIbrary of Parliament was originally built in 1876 and is the only part of the Centre Block to remain untouched after a fire in 1916. Inspired by the British Museum Reading Room, this library features a massive main chamber with a vaulted ceiling. The walls and bookshelves are lined with intricately carved white pine paneling.

Strahov Monastery Library, Prague

(images via: claudia dias, architecture.artyx.ru)

Part of a monastery that was established in the year 1143, the Strahov Monastery Library has a 46-foot ceiling decorated with a 1794 fresco entitled ‘The Struggle of Mankind to Know Real Wisdom’. It contains a vast collection of books as well as ancient printing presses.

Suzzallo Library at the University of Washington

(images via: railgun)

Completed in 1926 in Collegiate Gothic style, the University of Washington’s Suzzallo LIbrary contains an incredible 250-foot long, 52-foot wide Graduate Reading Room featuring a timber-vaulted ceiling, leaded windows and cast-stone ashlar wall blocks.

Admont Abbey Library, Austria

(images via: wikimedia commons)

The largest monastic library in the world is located in Admont in Austria. Admont Abbey was founded in 1074 and settled by Benedictine monks, and the spectacular gold and white library was added in 1776. It survived a disastrous 1865 fire that destroyed the rest of the monastery.

Real Gabinete Portugues de Leitura, Rio de Janeiro

(images via: rbpdesigner, servuloh)

This dark and somber reading room contains an amazing 350,000 books. The Real Gabinete Português de Leitura was built in the Manueline Portuguese style in 1837 and is four stories tall inside for maximum book storage without a cluttered, maze-like floor.

Iowa State Capitol Law Library

(images via: rata  bibliotecaria, state library of iowa)

A lacy white banister flows along tier after tier of books and down a beautiful spiral staircase at the Iowa State Capitol Law Library, located in the Capitol building. The library provides Iowa lawmakers, lawyers, government employees and the public with a specialized legal collection of treatises and law books.

Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, University of Toronto

(images via: the great geek manual, torontoist)

The Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library is located at the University of Toronto, and is the largest publicly accessible collection of rare books and manuscripts in Canada. It contains Darwin’s proof copy of On the Origin of the Species among other notable works.

George Peabody Library, Baltimore

(images via: elibris.jhu.edu)

One of the most beautiful libraries in America is located in Baltimore. The George Peabody LIbrary opened in 1878 and contains five tiers of ornamental cast-iron balconies rising to the skylight 61 feet above the floor. It contains 300,000 titles, most dating from the 18th to early 20th centuries.

Reading Room at the British Museum

(images via: tony harrison, pragmatopian)

At the heart of the British Museum is the Reading Room, completed in 1857 and restored in 2000. Considered a masterpiece of mid-19th century technology when it was built, the reading room was inspired by the domed Pantheon in Rome and measures 140 feet in diameter. The original gold, blue and cream color scheme was reinstated during the restoration.

Abbey Library of St. Gallen, Switzerland

(images via: chippee)

The library at the Abbey St. Gall in Switzerland is the country’s oldest, and considered one of the most important monastic libraries in the world. Its 2,100 manuscripts date back to the 8th through 15th centuries, and it also contains 160,000 books. The library, along with the rest of the abbey, is now a World Heritage Site as an ideal example of a Carolingian monastery.

Stockholm Public Library

(images via: marcus hansson, smath)

Stockholm’s rotunda library building, designed by architect Gunnar Asplund, was completed in 1932 and is still considered one of the city’s most important buildings. It is primarily comprised of a round lending hall in a tall cylindrical shape and also contains interior reading rooms. Polished black stucco gives the entrance a dramatic flair, and the hanging chandelier captures lights from the high clerestory windows.

Handlingenkamer, Netherlands

(images via: tweedekamer.nl)

The Old Library at the Dutch House of Representatives contains volume after volume of verbatim reports of parliament proceedings and debates. The roof was constructed as a leaded glass dome to allow daylight to filter down the four stories to the floor, which was necessary at the time it was built in the 19th century to avoid bringing combustibles like candles and gas lamps from setting the 100,000 volumes on fire.