To ensure good results attention must be directed to general lighting, which should be full in newspaper and similar rooms, but subordinate in reference libraries; and it is recommended that point lighting, with positions fixed and shades chosen to prevent glare, should be used at all reading points and tables; and if possible all lights should be suspended from the ceiling, as to fix them upon furniture involves the anchoring of the furniture to the floors or walls. In general lighting the use of the walls and ceilings as reflectors should be remembered, and the walls should be tinted in such colours as return the maximum reflection. The problem of lighting gangways of books has not been solved satisfactorily, but tube-o’-lights or line-o’-lights fixed on the top cornice of cases have given good results. Lights centred above gangways are the most usual method, but these produce shadows. We can touch upon this subject only briefly, but the gravest thought should be given to it, as systems of lighting which are most effective architecturally are often quite useless for library purposes.
The ventilation of the rooms should be thorough and yet exclude draughts; and on this matter, as upon the kindred matter of heating, we cannot do more here than refer to the recent literature upon those subjects.
129. Bibliography
Adams, H. B. Public Libraries and Popular Education (Home Education Bulletin, No. 31). Albany, University of the State of New York, 1900. (Valuable for the plans and elevations of American library buildings reproduced.)
Adams, M. B. Public Libraries: Their Building and Equipment. L.A.R., vol. vii., pp. 161, 220. (Reprinted from Journal of Royal Institute of British Architects.)
Burgoyne, F. J. Library Construction: Architecture, Fittings, Furniture, 1897. (Library Ser.)
—— Points in Library Planning. Greenwood’s Year Book, 1900, p. 12.
Champneys, A. L. Public Libraries: A Treatise on their Design, Construction, and Fittings, 1907.
Eastman, W. R. Library Buildings and Plans, 1906. N. York State Lib., Bulletin, 107, Lib. School, 22.
Graesel, A. Planning. In his Handbuch der Bibliothekslehre, 1902.