Selexyz Dominicanen, in Maastricht, Holland, is one of the most interesting, unusual bookshops in the world. As a 13th century Gothic church, this building was abandoned by the faith that brought it to life in 1294, and until 2006, it was in a state of advanced deterioration.
But if we’re looking for a library instead of a bookshop, we’ll find that, too. Doñana Palace, the old Spanish hunting lodge that has been turned into a technology center, houses a scientific library belonging to the CSIC (Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas de España, the Spanish National Research Council) in a chapel that had fallen out of use for at least two decades. Though it is small.
Should we be looking for something bigger, we can travel to Vught (the Netherlands), where St. Peter’s Church now houses not only an enormous library and restaurant but also a museum. The header for this article welcomes us to the library space, which we can also see below, this time the transept.