Idea Store Chrisp Street

As the closest library to my house, this is a decent library… I mean IDEA STORE. I’m still deciding whether the decision to re-​brand the Tower Hamlet libraries was a clever move or a confused one.
Anyway, they have a good selection of books at this location, some DVDs, some computers (but don’t count on getting one unless you get there early and sign up in advance even earlier.)
Not a great place to study (but apparently, a popular place to eat your lunch for lots of folk, which I think is odd) unless you can snag one of the Learning Labs when they’re not being used for knitting classes and the like.
I guess one benefit of the IDEA ‘STORE’ aspect is if you check out a bunch of books, they give you a bag like you’ve bought something, and for a minute you don’t feel like a broke student but like you’ve just scored some Waterstone best sellers. (Then you reach into the bag and realize the ‘New Mediterranean Cookbook’ was actually new in 1993.)
The best part though, is the online catalogue and the ability to request other books from other libraries to have them shipped to any location. Now that’s a brilliant IDEA. Ok, for that I will bump up to 4 stars.

One of the newer Ideas stores in Tower Hamlets, plush and modern on entering, Chrisp St has a large computer room on the ground floor, for library card holders to spend a free hour on the internet or word processing.
Upstairs is a large collection of books, DVDs, and CDs, as well as free wi-​fi access for those with laptops. There are long tables to study on, desks with power plugs for laptops, and the latest newspapers spread across the tables.
Feel free to roam on your own because the staff don’t use much effort to help you out.