History

The library was founded by students in 1929 under the name Bygningsteknisk Studiearkiv (BSA).
In 1930, the library was taken over by the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts as a department of the School of Architecture.
The library has been a public library since 1933.

The name Bygningsteknisk Studiearkiv was changed into Byggeriets Studiearkiv in 1983 and again into Kunstakademiets Arkitektskoles Bibliotek - KASB in 2000. The name then translated into The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts School of Architecture Library.
Under that name, the library celebrated its 75th anniversary in 2005. This was marked with the launch of a website documenting the library's development (www.kasb75.dk).

In 2007, KASB incorporated the Danish Town Planning Institute's collections consisting of appr. 20,000 books and about 80 different journals. As a result, the library holds what is argueably the most comprehensive collection on town planning in Denmark - both with regard to scope and historical perspective.

In 2011, several changes occurred at the library:

KASB was merged with the Danish Design School Library on 1 February - precipitating the later merger of the two schools. The libraries' collections were moved to the same address, organised by means of an extended classification system and integrated into a joint catalogue.

In April, we merged with the National School of Theatre and Contemporary Dance Library. The joint library's reading hall could expand over another 200 m2 that had been the Theatre Library's reading room in the far end of the library building. The old glass wall that had separated the two reading rooms from each other was taken down and the collections weeded and merged.
The library building - Holmen's former smithy - now houses one large library covering the fields of architecture, design and performing arts.
To acknowledge these developments, the library has been renamed with the temporary name Library of Architecture, Design and Performing Arts.

The official merger between the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts Schools of Architecture, design and Conservation came into action on 1 July 2011. As a result, our library catalogue FIND has included the field of conservation since 1 October 2011. The physical library of the School of Conservation (Konserveringsfagligt Viden Center - KViC), however, continues to be situated on Amaliegade 38.

As a consequence of the library mergers, we have introduced a new library system - PRIMO. PRIMO provides a more user-friendly interface and enables us to set up integrated search, i.e. the opportunity to search all of the library's online resources at once.

We have also introduced RFID technology, which allows us to secure and identify our materials in a new way and will install new borrowing machines and entry gates soon.

The additional space in our library hall will be used to set up additional work stations, group tables, a new lounge as well as a special area designated to materials on performing arts.