“Take a book, return a book”
Their Mission: To promote literacy through the indirect exchange of books.
“Little Free Libraries” project first launched in the USA in 2009 and now it’s an official project with thousands of little libraries in over 40 countries. Thanks to Lauri Alvandian and Nina Roma Aghvanian, the movement has also come to Armenia. The goals of LFL Armenia are to provide easier access to information, promote reading culture, preserve and celebrate the Armenian language, attract book loving tourists and community development. We can say that “Little Free Libraries” has now become a universal movement.
–Lauri, who was part of the implementation of this idea?
-The project was funded by “Birthright Armenia”, of which Nina and I are both alumni. Then we teamed up with “Four Peaks Landscape + Architecture”, who designed and built 15 libraries for us. And of course we had many friends who helped us paint, donated books, and supported us throughout the process.
– What was the first book you put into the first library you created?
– “The Meek One” by Fyodor Dostoevsky.
-Nina, was it easy to make this project come to life in Armenia? What kind of issues did you face over the course of the project?
-It was not very easy. At first, we wanted to build all the libraries ourselves, but finding the right materials and supplies was very difficult. That’s when we decided to partner with “Four Peaks Landscape + Architecture”. We are still facing some issues now, including getting permission to place libraries at certain locations, and also we are slowly running out of books. We are planning to launch a crowd funding campaign soon to fund the continuation of the project and buy many more books.
– What is the future of the little libraries in Armenia, Nina?
-We built 15 libraries and so far only two of them are installed. Once the first 15 are installed around Yerevan and its surrounding areas, we want to expand the project to the rest of the country. We hope to put little free libraries throughout all of Armenia!
The free little libraries can be found at Aram’s street, Lovers’ park and outside Aeon at 3a Teryan Street.
Melanie Sargsian
