Bidebarrietako Liburutegi nagusia
French eclectic clubhouse turned public library, once flooded and rebuilt around its original nineteenth-century staircase.
This guide to Bidebarrietako Liburutegi Nagusia, Bilbao's main library, starts with the city's high society breaking ground in 1888 on a clubhouse for El Sitio, a group honoring the volunteers who defended Bilbao through the Carlist Wars sieges. Architect Severino de Achucarro's French eclectic palace hosted dancing and fencing before the city converted it into a public library in 1956. It follows the building into the catastrophic floods of 1983, when the ground floor was ruined and the doors shut for years. Climb the original stone staircase Achucarro designed, still standing at the heart of the building.
Audio guides are written and narrated by AI.