A stone‑built cultural sanctuary on Via Romana
When walking along Via Romana in Bordighera it is impossible not to be captivated by the understated elegance of the International Civic Library. The building was designed in the early twentieth century when the local British community decided that the modest reading room in the Anglican church could no longer contain their growing collection. Funds were raised to erect a more suitable home, and in 1910 a two‑storey library in Victorian stone was completed. Its façade is graced by a semi‑circular portico supported by six columns and softened by a century‑old wisteria. Even today the scent of the flowering vine wafts across the library’s garden each April, an unforgettable introduction to one of the Mediterranean’s finest public libraries.
An outgrowth of Britain’s long love of reading
The establishment of Bordighera’s library says much about the literary culture of its founders. Eighteenth‑century Britain produced the modern novel; authors such as Daniel Defoe and his Robinson Crusoe, Henry Fielding (Tom Jones), and Laurence Sterne (Tristram Shandy) not only defined a new literary form but also encouraged reading among the middle classes. To meet this growing appetite for books, circulating libraries became popular in Britain and, when English families began wintering on the Ligurian coast, they brought the idea with them. The first reading room in Bordighera opened in about 1880 in the Anglican church. As the collection expanded it moved to Clarence Bicknell’s museum and then, thanks to local donations, to the purpose‑built library we see today.
Continue reading The English Community and Bordighera’s International Library
