We Need Books is Athens’ first multilingual library and multicultural centre, located in Kypseli. It has books for reading and lending in 37 languages, and offers free classes and activities. Our library was created and developed after identifying a need for a multicultural space in Athens, and access to books in the mother tongue of the significant percentage of its population which is not of Greek origin, particularly refugees and migrants.

We are working actively to be an inclusive space by adapting our services to the diversity of our community, its minorities and vulnerable groups. We do this through collection development, programming, reducing financial barriers to access, partnering with local organisations and taking participatory approaches to community engagement and service evaluation. All of this helps us to strengthen the community and contributes to social sustainability.

This paper will show how this approach has positively impacted our membership and visitor numbers. We will discuss the value of public libraries integrating social inclusion, cohesion, empathy, tolerance and equality into their work, and how it can advocate for change toward building inclusive and thriving communities free of prejudice and racism.

Our approach could become a blueprint for other grassroots libraries in Greece and abroad, and help other public libraries cater better to their local communities, which are becoming increasingly diverse.