Summary
New chapter: Landmark move for Greece's national library
Wearing masks and gloves, specialized staff gingerly place their treasured cargo inside wheeled, shock-absorbing boxes for a historic trip to the other end of Athens in the biggest book move in Greek history.
The Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center, named after one of Greece's most successful shipowners, cost nearly 600 million euros ($735 million) and took eight years to design and build.
Library staff say the move could not have come soon enough.
In a listed building that could not be easily remodeled and with a reading room of just 80 seats, staff say it was time to move on.
Just planning how to display the collections in the new 22,000-square-meter library building took a year, with the British Library acting as consultant to the SNF.
Four climate-controlled vaults will hold the library's rarest books and manuscripts, some of which date back to the 9th century, organizers said.
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