50 years of the Baunatal City Library: Festival week with fun for everyone!

50 years of the Baunatal City Library: Festival week with fun for everyone!

A very special anniversary is coming up in Baunatal: the city library is celebrating its 50th anniversary! This event will be celebrated with a week of celebrations from October 21st to 25th, 2025, and preparations are already in full swing. The team has planned numerous events that will have exciting offerings for all ages and interests. Whether silent disco, escape games or children's book readings - there is something for everyone here. Over the years, the library has established itself as a lively meeting place that has much more to offer than just books.

The city library was recently extensively modernized and expanded. The renovation from 2012 to 2014 meant that the rooms now appear brighter and more open and an even greater variety of media is available. In addition to classic books, visitors can now also borrow eBooks, audio books, films, magazines as well as board and console games. This diversity attracts over 300 people every day who not only read here, but also learn and meet over a cup of coffee. The library has established itself as a “third place” in the region and is recognized for its commitment with prizes, including the Hessian Library Prize.

Media literacy in focus

A particularly important aspect of the city library's work is promoting media literacy, especially among children and young people. The management team, consisting of Jutta Kraut and Katja Freitag, has set up various programs to enable young readers to use digital media. This includes, among other things, a regular reading lesson for preschool children under the motto “Picture book fun”, where volunteer reading sponsors inspire the little ones.

Every school child in Baunatal comes to the library at least once a year, thanks to the school and daycare center tours. Specific topics such as author readings are offered for third graders, while young people can deal with current challenges such as fake news and digital research.

Diverse media offering

The library has a total of around 43,000 media, including 20,000 specifically for children and young people. The loan is designed to be child-friendly: every school child can get a library card free of charge, while adults have access to the extensive collections for just 15 euros annually. Popular items to borrow include console games for the Switch, PS4 and PS5 as well as the latest e-readers and the sought-after Tonieboxes for the youngest children. A large selection of digital offerings, such as the picture book app “Tigerbox”, rounds off the offering.

At a time when competition from digital media is becoming increasingly noticeable, the Baunatal public library shows that it is very popular with innovative programs and a wide range of media offerings. The diverse events and modern equipment are the best examples of how libraries can maintain their place even in the digital age.

The upcoming 50th anniversary celebrations of the city library are an ideal example of how important such facilities are to the community. They not only offer access to knowledge and entertainment, but also promote exchange and togetherness in the city. It will be exciting to see what the festival week has in store.