If you love books, libraries are some of the most spectacular buildings in the world.
To celebrate these monumentally important buildings, we’ve complied a list of the most magnificent libraries on the planet.
From a library hidden in the forests of Beijing to one in Egypt that was designed like a sundial, these are the libraries that all book lovers should visit in their lifetime.
The Admont Library in Admont, Austria
Located in the foothills of the Alps, this beautiful library is the second largest monastery library in the world. The library hall was designed in the late Baroque style by the architect Joseph Hueber in 1776 with a nearly 230-foot-long hall that contains 200,000 volumes.
The ceilings were painted by Bartolomeo Altomonte and show the stages of human knowledge, up to the high point of Divine Revelation.