ILAB POP UP BOOK FAIRS - SPEED DATING FOR BOOKLOVERS
ON UNESCO WORLD BOOK & COPYRIGHT DAY, 23 APRIL 2016
Dear Colleagues,
Please join us on Saturday April 23, 2016 when we will focus world attention on rare books and associated materials. At this time when UNESCO and many others throughout the world celebrate literacy, ILAB booksellers will once again run a worldwide 24 hour campaign to promote our trade and to raise money for literacy.
If ever there was a year to get involved it is 2016, as it is the 400th anniversary of the deaths of both Shakespeare and Cervantes! So don't hesitate, join us!
What should you do and where should you do it? Many ILAB affiliates across the world will organise Pop Up Book Fairs - they will gather in a bookish flashmob with a few colleagues and showcase a few of their most interesting items in a venue, which may be a surprising unusual venue, or may be the local library, a national institution, a railway station, a business club, it doesn't matter - wherever you can find. In fact you and your colleagues might prefer to organise another type of event - a Pop Up book party, a short exhibition, a valuation session, a public debate ... Please, do so! The main thing is to do something!
The purpose of ILAB's participation in World Book and Copyright Day is to spotlight rare books and bookselling while raising money for what is at the very foundation of all we do - literacy.
We intend to grab the attention of the rare book Internet community, our customers, librarians and the world's media again next year. Help us make the great chain of events organized by ILAB booksellers on UNESCO World Book & Copyright Day 2016 a worldwide - virtual and real - sensation.
Already some organisers have booked venues for next April and begun some preliminary advertising. Use this opportunity to show the book trade in a very unusual and positive manner.
On April 23 this year ILAB Booksellers worldwide connected with the public and other booksellers in a way that was different to anything that had been done before. No less than 32 ILAB Pop Up Book Fairs, all held during the 24 hours of April 23, starting one after another across the world, embodied so much of what is at the core of ILAB: working together to promote the rare book trade and to improve the world of books for all of us all.
On UNESCO World Book & Copyright Day 2015 ILAB booksellers brought the books to the people. They popped up at the most unexpected places, in schools, at train stations, restaurants, pubs, schools, museums, libraries, woolsheds, business clubs, in the streets, on boats, on skyscrapers. For 24 hours they were part of a great chain of books spanning across the world, raising over 10,000 Euros to support literacy worldwide and showing the most beautiful bookish items to people many of whom had never seen or touched such treasures before.
It was an amazing experience.
BOOKISH FLASHMOBS - ACROSS THE WORLD
Remember! There was a charity auction in Cape Town, an appraisal day in Moscow, while the day opened with Pop Ups in Australia, with a progression of ILAB Pop Ups through Asia, Europe and then across the United States. The creativity shown by the ILAB affiliates was inspiring. If you have in mind static fairs where middle aged and older booksellers showed their wares to similarly aged book buyers think again - and take a look back on our blog where we spent the whole, yes, the entire 24 hours putting together live!
When we reported about the ILAB Pop Up Celebrations in 2015 during the ILAB Presidents' Meeting in Seville in September this year, most presidents of ILAB's member associations spontaneously agreed to have another go in their country on 23 April 2016. We are proud to report that ILAB Pop Up Book Fairs on UNESCO World Book & Copyright Day 2016 are already planned for the following countries:
AUSTRALIA (Sydney, State Library of New South Wales) - JAPAN (Tokyo) - RUSSIA (Moscow) - SOUTH AFRICA (Cape Town) - SPAIN (Madrid and Barcelona) - ITALY (Turin) - AUSTRIA (Vienna) - HUNGARY (Budapest, Istituto Cervantes) - GERMANY (Munich, Kaufmanns Casino) - SWITZERLAND (Zurich, Club Voltaire) - FRANCE (Paris, in cooperation with the International Rare Book & Autograph Fair at the Grand Palais) - BELGIUM - NETHERLANDS - DENMARK (Copenhagen) - SWEDEN - UNITED KINGDOM (London) - UNITED STATES (New York, New Castle, Seattle).
This already is an impressive list of participating countries and cities. Help us make it even more impressive! Join us, look for an exciting venue in your hometown. Everything and anything is possible. Your imagination is the only limiting factor.
Don't let the nay-sayers either others or in your own mind stop you. If your town or city makes it difficult to hold a book fair in a unusual venue - see if another business or institution would like you to hold something with them. So often clubs, associations and institutions are looking for easy different events to hold. Events that show they are active, align them with a good cause, UNESCO and literacy are strong attractions. We would be happy to talk through options and events that have worked elsewhere with you if you would like - just ask us!
HELP US MAKE THE 2016 ILAB POP UP CELEBRATIONS EVEN BIGGER
JOIN US ON 23 APRIL 2016!
ILAB Pop Up Fairs are just that, quick events that pop up and are gone. ILAB Pop Up Fairs are bookish flashmobs, simple, spontaneous, cool - speed dating for book lovers. With their smaller more informal format they are a nimble, interesting and exciting way of presenting antiquarian bookselling in the 21st century, attracting people far beyond the usual book fair visitors to people who haven't previously been aware of the fascination of old and rare books. The ILAB Pop Ups are an amazing means to attract younger people, and they are a proof that that ILAB's motto is still alive: Amor librorum nos unit.
Now is the perfect time to talk to colleagues and organise something in your area. We invite you to use World Book & Copyright Day 2016 day as creatively as you can - promote your books, promote the rare book trade and support literacy, which is at the core of all we do.
Dear Colleagues, 
Remember! There was a charity auction in Cape Town, an appraisal day in Moscow, while the day opened with Pop Ups in Australia, with a progression of ILAB Pop Ups through Asia, Europe and then across the United States. The creativity shown by the ILAB affiliates was inspiring. If you have in mind static fairs where middle aged and older booksellers showed their wares to similarly aged book buyers think again - and
ILAB Pop Up Fairs
