Libraries are, at their best, an oasis of calm and a gateway to new knowledge. But there’s more to love than just your local branch. Seattle has an assortment of interesting private and public libraries that go beyond the ordinary. Have you heard about the tucked-away library inside Pike Place Market? Or the Talking Book and Braille Library, with thousands of audiobooks created by volunteers? What about the occult library behind a bookstore on Capitol Hill? Winter is probably the best time of year to curl up with a book, so why not find some new spots to do it—and explore the city in the process.
Folio: Seattle Athenaeum
📍 93 Pike Street #307 (3rd Floor, Pike Place Market), Seattle
🕐 Monday – Saturday, 10 am – 5 pm
💰 $5 day pass, or annual memberships available
🚗 Multiple parking garages nearby; accessible via Link light rail to Westlake
The Pike Place Market holds so many treasures, it feels like you could explore for years and still find more. One of the most notable is on the third floor of the Sanitary Market building, just above Tenzing Momo. It’s a book-filled paradise in the form of a members’ library called Folio: The Seattle Athenaeum. The lending library includes more than 12,000 books, and members can check out titles from the catalog for up to 60 days. There’s also a local history room filled with treasures from the Pacific Northwest and beyond. But Folio is also a great, quiet place to come and work on your own writing—you can drop in for just $5 a day.
✨ Highlights
🏛️ Hidden gem in Pike Place Market
🌅 Beautiful Elliott Bay views
💳 Accessible via $5 day pass or an annual membership
🎭 Regular events like Friday happy hours, readings, and music
Theosophical Society Library
📍 717 Broadway E, Seattle (Capitol Hill)
🕐 Thursday, Saturday, Sunday 12 pm – 5 pm; Friday 12 pm – 4 pm
Want to take a little occult field trip? Head to the back of Quest Bookshop, close to the historic Loveless Building on Broadway near Roy. Go all the way to the back of the bookstore, step through an antechamber, and prepare to be pleasantly surprised after you open the unremarkable-looking door. This warm reading room, complete with nice velvet reading chairs, has been around for about a century. The collection includes around 8,000 titles on philosophy, world religions, parapsychology, reincarnation, tarot, dreams, yoga, vegetarianism, and Spiritualism (not the same thing as Spirituality—it’s mostly about talking to the dead). Theosophist heroes such as Annie Besant and Helena Blavatsky beam down from the walls and big chunks of amethyst decorate the shelves. Theosophy, by the way, is a school of occultist thought that gained renown in the late 19th century and helped inspire the New Age movements of the 1970s and beyond.
💁 Pro tips
🧘 Weekly mediations and other events
📚 Books can be borrowed with a membership ($30 annually)
🪑 Long tables for reading books or tarot cards
📖 Collection of vintage books from early Seattle police captain Irene S. Durham
Elizabeth C Miller Horticultural Library
📍 3501 NE 41st St, Seattle (U-District)
🕐 Mondays: 12 pm – 8 pm; Tuesdays – Fridays: 9 am – 5 pm, Saturdays: 9 am – 3 pm
Have you ever visited a library in the middle of a bog? The Elizabeth C. Miller Horticultural Library comes close, nestled near the University of Washington wetlands and the Union Bay Natural Area. Part of the UW Center for Urban Horticulture, it has more than 15,000 books and 400 magazine titles related to plants and gardening. It’s a great place to research plants both from a practical perspective and a historical/cultural angle—the latest edition of their newsletter discussed the cyclamen in art. It’s also just a peaceful place to sit and read about trees. Plus, there are rotating art exhibits.
🌟 Fun facts
🌿 Largest horticulture reference collection in the Pacific Northwest
📞 Plant answer line at 206-897-5268 (206-UW-PLANT)
🎨 Arts and crafts group show and sale through December 28th, 2024
African-American Collection at Douglass-Truth
📍 2300 E Yesler Wy, Seattle (Central District)
🕐 Mondays: 10 am – 6 pm; Tuesdays & Wednesdays 10 am – 8 pm; Thursdays 12 am – 8 pm; Fridays – Sundays 10 am – 6 pm
🚗 Near the 27 and 8 bus lines
Named for Frederick Douglass and Sojourner Truth, the Douglass-Truth Library in the Central District has one of the biggest collections of African American literature and history on the West Coast. Its handsome, light-filled space holds more than 10,000 items, including biographies, magazines (think great old copies of Essence and Jet), literature, music and film. It’s also filled with art, including prints from Black artist and activist Charles White depicting everyday lives of Black people in midcentury America. Those prints were purchased and donated by the local chapter of the Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, a national sorority for Black college women. The sorority contributed greatly to the library, donating books in 1965 that launched what’s now called the African-American Collection of literature and history. There’s an exhibit about them at the library, featuring historical photos, ephemera, flowers, and a giant pink tulle skirt.
✨ Highlights
📚 Great reference books on local Black history and beyond
👨👩👧👦 Genealogy collections
🎨 Paintings of Frederick Douglass and Sojourner Truth, plus other art
🗿 21-foot wooden sculpture depicting African-American history called the “Soul Pole”
🌍 Materials in Amharic, Oromo, Spanish, and Tigrinya
Washington Talking Book and Braille Library
📍 2021 9th Ave Seattle (South Lake Union)
🕐 Monday – Friday, 8:30–5 pm
🚗 Accessible via the South Lake Union streetcar
The Washington Talking Book & Braille Library, in a cozy spot near South Lake Union, is a fantastic local resource. It’s run by the Washington Secretary of State as a place for all Washington residents who have trouble reading standard print materials, whether because of blindness, a reading disability, or other reasons. You need to fill out an application to become a patron, but then you can borrow and read several different kinds of books, including ones in Braille, large print, and really cool talking books that come with their own players. A stuffed-animal-filled kids’ area near the window is home to a Multisensory Storytime on Fridays at 11 am, where kids up to 5 years old can “wiggle, sing, read, and play.” The library even produces its own audiobooks—3,000 so far!—with the help of 80 volunteer narrators.
ℹ️ Good to know
📖 Open to anyone unable to read standard print material, you just need to apply
🎧 Offers digital audiobooks, Braille books, large print books, and other formats
🧸 Kids’ area filled with stuffed animals
