Results of placing a part of the collections in "free stabling"

Since 1985, the public library of Lausanne has undertaken to provide, in its open access section classified by UDC, an area where 3,000 volumes equipped only with bar-codes, unclassified, are arrayed in rows on racks of 11.8, 15 and 16.7 cms. as in secondhand booksellers. The speed of getting the books into circulation (2 days), a selection that mixes bestsellers and good works that have been publicised to a certain extent by the media, or reissued works, popularisation to a good standard - these are generally works arranged in duplicate on the shelves. The aim is to show the potential of disorder, to create a dynamic that will allow the books thus chosen to lead towards the rest of the work of an author, of a collection or of a publisher on the road to success. The relative collapse of classics and of non-bestselling books has altered the choice of these copies on "free access", a good example of cultural promotion. Readers are encouraged to rummage, browse and search, and so find what they had not been looking for.
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