The New Library – Part one | 1983 - 2026

As Rotterdam’s Central Library enters a new chapter, The New Library – Part One documents a defining moment in the life of one of the city’s most recognisable public buildings. Following the careful dismantling of its distinctive interior, the film traces the library’s origins and explores how it has embodied changing ideas about knowledge, public space, and urban life over the past forty years. Combining archival material with contemporary voices, it places the building within Rotterdam’s continuous process of reinvention, asking how a city can move forward while remaining connected to the places that shape its collective memory. The first chapter of a documentary diptych, the film offers a timely portrait of an iconic Post ’65 landmark and the questions its future raises for the city and its inhabitants.