SIBUR helped set up an unusual library space in Tomsk
6 september 2021
Since the end of June, Tomsk has been hosting Library in the Old City Style, a project of the city’s Municipal Information Library System designed to reflect the city’s urban style and introduce its residents to unorthodox library formats. The project has been made possible thanks to its winning a grant contest under SIBUR's social investment program, the Formula for Good Deeds.
As part of the project, an open-air library was set up in Novo-Sobornaya Square, designed to look as a large bookcase with carved window frames in the style of Tomsk’s traditional wooden architecture. Stored inside the bookcase are books, board games, as well as tables and chairs installed there for readers’ convenience. A local specimen of wooden architecture at 10 Frunze Avenue served as an inspiration to its authors for setting up the structure.
On Saturdays, a literary and entertainment program is on offer there introducing the residents to new ways of interacting with books. Thanks to the Library in the Old City Style, Tomsk residents get a chance to experience a new way of interacting with modern types of libraries, the ones that are not associated with dusty rows of book shelves. The exterior design chosen by the authors for their project helps the readers get a little closer to their city’s culture.
This is very much a typical Tomsk project, truly worthy of our intellectual city. I am sure that this platform will quickly gain popularity and will become a place of attraction for our residents, Mikhail Ratner, Deputy Mayor of Tomsk, has said.
Modern libraries are expanding their boundaries, including via solutions such as this one. And for books and knowledge, there are no boundaries at all. Books contain unique experiences that change us and help us make the world a better place. As a company, we have already taken part in seven urban projects in the field of culture within the Formula for Good Deeds program. And we do not intend to stop at that, Vladimir Pleshkov, General Director of Tomskneftekhim LLC, shared.
Such creative library-themed solutions help us resurrect the love for "paper" books. And so now, by discovering a new literary world, you are getting closer to your city, Alexander Yeremin, Government Relations Advisor to the General Director of Tomskneftekhim LLC, commented.
Background information:
The Formula for Good Deeds, SIBUR's social investment program was launched on February 1, 2016 in all key cities where the company operates. It is being implemented across six focus areas covering all essential social sector domains: urban development, education and science, sports and healthy living, environmental protection, culture, and volunteering.
In 2016-2021, 781 projects in nineteen cities emerged as grant competitions’ winners. The grants’ funds have been used to repair and rebuild social facilities, improve and beautify parks and other public spaces, organize sports and mass-scale cultural events, equip school laboratories, and take other measures to improve the quality of life in the regions where the company operates..