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At Casual Poet Library, opening in August, every shelf is rented to an individual wanting to loan their books for free. Its founder Rebecca Toh wasn’t sure people would embrace the idealism and “impracticality” of a community-funded library – but she was proven wrong.
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After working for a decade, freelance photographer Rebecca Toh embarked on a one-year sabbatical earlier this year – and ended up taking on more work. But this time, the Singaporean revisited her childhood dream of owning a bookstore, albeit with a minor adaptation. She decided to build a library.
Set to open to the public next Monday (Aug 5), Casual Poet Library, situated at a void deck in Alexandra Village in Bukit Merah, was inspired by her holiday to Japan in April, where she stumbled upon the country’s first community library.
The Minna no Toshokan Sankaku library in Yaizu city, a small fishing town within the Shizuoka prefecture, functions like a regular library, except for one key detail: Every shelf is rented by an individual who pays a small monthly fee to display their own books for others to loan.
It was opened in March 2020, and more than 50 such libraries have since sprung up across Japan to revitalise local communities.
