Cultural crisis.

The best architectural library that the world has ever seen is under imminent threat of irrevocable damage. The RIBA must make a plan for the future of the library that is credible both culturally and financially - and stick to it.

The British Architectural Library, in effect the library of the Royal Institute of British Architects, is the finest architectural library in the world. Its collections of books, drawings, periodicals, manuscripts, electronic media products and photographs may be bettered individually, but taken as a whole, they constitute the greatest integrated assembly of architectural knowledge that the world has ever seen. It is more comprehensive than any of the nationally owned collections anywhere, for they tend to collect only works published in their own countries. It is better than any other professional or academic architectural library, partly because the RIBA is the oldest architectural institute in the world,(1) so it has had more time in which to collect, and partly because it was founded at a time when Britain was wealthy, and the profession believed that architecture was a liberal profession that depended on scholarship.

Now, the profession has a quite different temper. Though it is many, many times bigger than the body which founded the library, it is clear that the RIBA now neither has the money nor the will to maintain it. There are perhaps some good reasons for this,(2) but there are bad ones too, for example, a constitution which ensures that it is almost impossible to set and achieve long-term strategies.(3)

A great crisis has arrived. The Institute has known for 26 years that it had to set up new accommodation for its drawings collection.(4) It has generated a succession of plans, ranging from bringing the collection back to fine accommodation next to the other elements of the library in the headquarters building, to moving it to a new grand centre at the Roundhouse.(5) After a great deal of time, money and effort had been expended, this last proposal was turned down on the flimsiest excuses by the Heritage Lottery. Fund, an outcome that showed bungling, if not downright stupidity on both sides.

Now, after further expensive work by consultants (which has confirmed what was known already), the library problem is no further towards being solved than it was 10 years ago. And it is getting worse every day, for not only can the RIBA not find a suitable home for its drawings collection, it cannot evolve a proper policy for accommodating growth (every living library has to grow to keep abreast of current publications, without discarding those of the past).

Matters have come to such a pass that some hooligans at the RIBA are suggesting that parts of the permanent collections should be sold. This will be a catastrophe in terms of losing knowledge (who are we to decide what future generations will want to consult?), and it will ensure that no one will give the library material or money(6) ever again.

In any other civilized country, the government would help as a matter of course, but so confused is the RIBA at presenting its case (and perhaps so fundamentally philistine the government of Cool Britannia) that no sensible relationship has been evolved. The RIBA could try to give the library away, but existing institutions which are capable of looking after its material (for instance the British Library or the Victoria and Albert Museum, even if they could be persuaded to take it on) would undoubtedly wish to break up and amalgamate the collections with theirs, impose their own acquisitions policy and so on.

As we go to press, it is mooted that a new trust, which will be independent of the RIBA (though with Institute representation on its board) should be set up to receive the special collections.(7) The idea is good in that it may allow this part of the library to be seen to be independent of an institution increasingly devoted to promoting the self interest of its members, rather than serving civil architecture, for which it (and the library) were originally set up. Properly organized, the trust should be able to attract support much more easily than the Institute.

But the proposal is bad in that, as it is now envisaged, the trust will not receive the collections of books and periodicals. It cannot be emphasized enough that the incomparable potential of the library lies in its collections being made available together. If necessary, this may mean the printed material leaving its much loved specially designed 1930s premises in the Institute's Portland Place headquarters(8) to join the special collections in a new home. In any case, new proposals for the management of the Institute suggest that a rump of the library left behind in Portland Place will lack effective representation in the Institute's decision-making structure.

This is the last moment of the last hour. The RIBA must finally face its responsibilities, its debts to the ancestors who so generously built up the library for us, and its responsibility for enhancing their legacy and passing it on to our descendants. It needs all the assistance it can get, but to get help, the Institute must produce a culturally creative plan, and stick to it through thick and thin.

1 It was founded in 1834.

2 For instance, the professions were gaining in power in the 1830s, when Victorian clients needed independent advice to cope with the principle of caveat emptor (let the buyer beware) adopted by rampaging capitalist industry. Now, governments believe they can use regulations to control industry on behalf of consumers, and they regard professions (except perhaps medicine and the law) as unnecessary impediments to trade. The RIBA has to spend much effort on combating the attitude.

3 An over-emphasis on regional representation has, for instance. ensured that many members of the Institute's council are (to put the matter at best) excessively concerned with parochial issues. Regional members are often elected on paltry numbers of votes, sometimes even without a poll.

4 In 1972, the collection was moved with great panache by John Harris (then its curator) from the RIBA's Portland Place headquarters to splendid (but now inadequate) accommodation in Portman square. The lease on the latter runs out in 2002.

5 A disused railway building not very far from the RIBA hq. As well as the drawings, it was to house the other special collections: the manuscripts and photographs for instance.

6 With great dedication, the library staff attracts more grants for cataloguing, preservation and special purchases than ally other library in Britain, except that of the British Museum.

7 For details see The Architects' Journal 4 June 1998, p11.

8 But it must not leave London, which is the most easily accessible place from both other regions of Britain and overseas. An alternative strategy would be to move most of the stuff who serve the trades union functions of the RIBA out of the hq, and devote the magnificent building to the collections, exhibitions and architectural meetings.

9 Who, as Honorary Librarian of the RIBA in 1992 and 1993, is not without blame in the whole debacle.