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Propaganda leaflet of the Institute of Culture and Popular Women’s Library

Date
1910
Archive
Municipal Archive of Barcelona
Document type
Imatge fixa
Reference code
CAT-AHCB-AHCB2-279-43-2-3
Link to the online document
Description

Leaflet from the Institute of Culture and Popular Women’s Library in which it is announced that the library is open to all working girls (tailors, embroiderers, cooks, among others) for ten cents a month and that books, copies of figurines, drawings, etc., can be borrowed. The Popular Women’s Library, founded in 1909 by the writer and pedagogue Francesca Bonnemaison, was the first women’s public library in Europe, twenty years ahead of the Fawcett Library in London. The following year (1910) the Institute of Women’s Culture was created, which aimed to offer scientific, artistic and manual knowledge for its users, exceptional at the time in terms of training offered to women. The library and later the institute, therefore, aimed to provide specialized knowledge to women so that they arrived well prepared for the labor market. In this formative aspect, the Institute will be inspired by models from all over Europe and the world. Its first seat was the church of Santa Anna in Barcelona, ​​although it soon moved to Carrer d’Elisabets. In 1922, it inaugurated its definitive location in the Sant Pere més Baix manor house.