Are Little Free Libraries Good For Communities?

Monorail City

The take-a-book, leave-a-book movement is going global, but not everyone is excited about it. These localized book-sharing boxes have been put under recent scrutiny and accused of being elitist and nothing more than a highly visible form of self-gratification cleverly disguised as book aid (but how do you really feel???). This opinion caught the attention of CityLab and other mainstream media, and then suddenly everyone had an opinion. In a not-so-surprising twist, there are a lot of people who disagree. Teale Phelps Bondaroff, a local champion of the Little Free Library scene in Victoria, Canada, is one of those people and he joins us to share his rebuttal against this criticism and provides a very compelling case as to why these little public boxes of books are actually really good for building community, promoting literacy and supporting placemaking. He also shares why we all need more ‘whimsical’ things in our life. Enjoy!