From the archives: Building reviews Peckham Library, 1999

By Tom Lowe2025-07-16T06:00:00

Source: Roderick Coyne / Alsop Arch

Alsop & Störmer’s Stirling Prize-winning library is given a rave review by Building’s impressed, if slightly confused, architecture critic

Few buildings in London are as baffling as Peckham library. Designed by Will Alsop and Jan Störmer, it actively set out to confound passersby with its playful and almost random assemblage of features. Its eccentric upside-down shape, its wonky columns and the charming red “beret” on its roof were designed, in the interests of promoting literature, to persuade locals to have a look inside, even if just out of curiosity.

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