British designer and artist Es Devlin recently unveiled Library of Us, an immersive and large-scale rotating library installation presented during Miami Art Week. Conceived as a spatial reflection of the books that have shaped her creative thinking over the years, the installation transforms reading into a collective, performative experience. Situated on the beachfront of the Faena Beach Hotel in Miami Beach, Library of Us forms part of the Faena Arts programme, coinciding with the city’s annual art season centred around Art Basel. Know more about the installation on SURFACES REPORTER (SR).
At its heart is a triangular shelving structure that slowly rotates atop a shallow circular pool of water.
The Library of Us installation is set atop a metallic plinth and takes on a distinctive compass-inspired geometry. At its heart is a triangular shelving structure that slowly rotates atop a shallow circular pool of water. Encircling this moving core is a continuous circular reading desk, accompanied by chairs arranged for visitors to sit, read and observe. This arrangement creates a dynamic spatial relationship between stillness and motion, thereby inviting participants to engage not only with the books but also with one another.
Housing approximately 2,500 books, the Library of Us library contains a carefully curated selection of titles that have formed Devlin’s intellectual and artistic journey. The books are deliberately spaced along the shelves, allowing daylight to filter through the installation and animate it with shifting patterns of light and shadow. After dusk, the structure comes alive through illumination, turning the library into a glowing beacon along the beachfront.
Devlin’s concept draws heavily from her personal experience of libraries as places of quiet intensity and shared intellectual presence. For her, libraries as environments where minds are actively engaged and imaginations roam freely, even as readers remain physically still. For her, the act of reading is not solitary but social. That’s how Library of Us seeks to embody this idea by creating a setting where viewers rotate into one another’s sightlines, and are connected through language, knowledge and curiosity.
Housing approximately 2,500 books, the Library of Us library contains a carefully curated selection of titles that have formed Devlin’s intellectual and artistic journey.
As visitors take their seats around the circular desk, the rotating central structure continuously alters perspectives, encouraging fresh encounters and visual connections. Enhancing this exchange, Meta collaborated with Ray-Ban to provide smart glasses that offer live English to Spanish translations, expanding accessibility and reinforcing the installation’s emphasis on inclusivity and shared understanding across cultures. Each day throughout the art week, Devlin personally selects a group of books for focused reading sessions. One of the shelves incorporates an LED screen, which displays excerpts from the books alongside corresponding audio readings, allowing literature to be experienced both visually and aurally. Reportedly, at the conclusion of the week-long event, the book collection from Library of Us will be donated to local libraries.
Image credit: Oriol Tarridas