Is it a dream? Is it real? Have we found Heaven on Earth?
It’s called Bookcity and it’s located 30km outside of Seoul, South Korea. It is a city built upon a foundation of books. It’s planning and construction guided by “the principles of book making that we use everyday. Book making is similar to architecture in that it takes pains to design and if the design is not satisfactory, one begins again from scratch”
It’s goal is to concentrate the publishing industry in an “eco-friendly industrial city”
Here are a few nuggets from their website:
-From the beginning, the Bookcity project was planned and established as an industrial city related specifically to books. It is intended as a place devoted to planning, producing and distributing books by well-intentioned publishers.
-The Bookcity project places the utmost value in this “Community in Practice.” This is based on the very simple principle of controlling personal, selfish desires in favor of considering common interests first.
– Bookcity is an eco-friendly city born out of the criticism that the excess consumption-dominated contemporary industrialization model has destroyed our environment
– Bookcity ambitiously offers dreams and wisdom to the young people of Korea through the medium of books while holding a variety of events including exhibitions and performances.
Can I wake up now?
Cover of the catalog of the exhibition ‘Paju Book City, Korea’ curated by Kim Young-joon and held at Aedes West in Berlin, 2005More:
Edward Heathcote’s piece, A city dedicated to books and print, in the Financial Times
Top image via