Books About Town

If you live in London you may have noticed that some weird benches have started popping up everywhere. Always surrounded by flocks of tourists, it’s taken me a while to find out what it’s all about… so just in case you too were all wondering what they are I thought I’d do a post.

The project is called Books About Town and was set up by the National Literacy Trust, which for those of you that don’t know is a charity working to increase literacy in disadvantaged children and young people in the UK.

For 10 weeks this summer BookBenches will be placed throughout London. There are four areas or Trails where the benches will be focused on – Bloomsbury, Riverside (around London Bridge), Greenwich and the City - and each bench is crafted to look like an opened book and decorated with visual art from local artists within the theme of a well-known classic.

Now London has no shortage of benches but these do look pretty cool and there’s always our inner child that likes the idea of a good old fashioned treasure hunt. Ok, maybe ‘treasure’ is not a great word but these BookBenches are out there to be found and collected.

At the end of the 10 weeks, the Benches will be auctioned off to raise money for the National Literacy Trust At the end of a literary summer of discovery, creativity and enjoyment our unique BookBenches will be brought together in a final display and auctioned off to raise money for the National Literacy Trust. Have a look at some of the benches below and see if you can guess which books they're from... (not meant to sound like a primary teacher...). Or, alternatively, you could take a look at the website to see which benches are out there and get any more information: www.booksabouttown.org.uk.