AJC Architects designed Abbotsleigh Junior Library and Innovation Centre as a space that fosters learning in Sydney, Australia.

Designed to delight and inspire young minds, with rippling circular forms to show that learning is not linear.

Creating the 1,140 m² centre involved modifying an existing 1950s building and inserting a new glass ovoid building that beautifully punctuates the more conventional campus buildings, and affords staff a 360-degree view of the children at all times.

The library and new external staircase link previously disconnected areas, forming a cohesive central hub of the campus with indoor/outdoor learning spaces around the ovoid glass building

Interiors of the tech-enabled library use organic circular forms drawn from nature with a maze of curved bookcases, an immersion for wide-screen viewing, glow-worm ‘caves’ for quiet reading and spiral-patterned ceilings referencing ripples in a pond.

Uniting the old and new buildings is an undulating canopy of glass-reinforced concrete that signals the library entrance and shelters an outdoor play area.

Design: AJC Architects
Photography: Ben Guthrie