Architecture + Design

This Incredible Library With a Pool Roof Lets You Walk on Water

Designed by Chinese architecture firm 3andwich, the clifftop structure also features stunning ocean views 
Person walking through pool on top of roof
All photos: Jin Weiqi, He Wei, Huizhou Shuangyue Bay Real Estate Investment and Development Co., Ltd.

A new library in Shuangyue Bay, China, is technically underwater, though not in the way you might imagine. Designed by Chinese firm 3andwich, the recently opened Water Drop Library features a concave roof topped with a crystal clear pool. Composed of two distinct parts—a circular main structure and a long walled walkway extending into the surrounding terrain—the building has a “poetic tension,” the firm said in statement. Upon a first look, it’s a study in simplicity: two basic geometric forms, a single story, and minimal white facade. But on a closer look, the pool-roofed library half submerged into a cliff is anything but easy. 

Accessing the library requires trekking through a tortuous terrain. 

The protruding walkway welcomes visitors, who then descend through a staircase into the main structure. Readers can also enter through another entrance at the library’s base accessible via a series of pathways cut through the hillside. 

Stairs from the walkway let visitors “dive” under the pool to access to the library.

The architects admit that accessing the library isn’t as simple as parking a car in a lot and walking through a pair of front doors, but it’s not supposed to be. “Entering the building is a journey to reunderstand nature and oneself,” the firm said in a statement. The circuitous terrain is supposed to symbolize the sometimes difficult educational journey. As such, the designers gave the exterior walkway a nickname: the path to the mountain of books. 

The main room features a calming pallet of white and gray. 

Reading areas around the bookshelves provide incredible views.

Small exhibitions or parties can be held in this private room. 

Inside, the interior walls are made up of built-in shelving, while the outside ones are floor-to-ceiling windows encircling the space in natural light and expansive views of the sea. Reading areas styled with modern furniture are placed throughout the main room. In the center of the library, accessible through a break in the shelving, visitors will find a dark, secluded, and quiet room, engulfed in wood paneling. 

From certain angles, the pool appears to blend into the sea. 

A staircase leads patrons up the roof, where the building’s true genius takes shape. Bowl-shaped, the roof holds a shallow pool with soft blue waters. A series of stepping stones make it possible to journey into the aquatic repository’s center, and, if caught from the right angle, it gives the illusion that visitors are walking on water. “The building has a sense of existence,” the firm said, “and becomes the connection point between people and the environment.”