Representatives of the Bodleian Libraries Visit the National Library of Poland
On Tuesday, 7 July 2026, the National Library of Poland welcomed representatives of the University of Oxford’s Bodleian Libraries: Antony Brewerton, Associate Director for Academic Library Services and Keeper of Collections; Judith Siefring, Head of Digital Collections Discovery; and Barbara Baj Wojtowicz of the Taylor Institution Library. The delegation was accompanied by Anna Błasiak, Head of Literature at the Polish Cultural Institute in London.
The guests were welcomed by Julia Konopka-Żołnierczuk, Deputy Director of the National Library of Poland. They toured the permanent exhibition of treasures of Polish written heritage at the Palace of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, where they were introduced to the history of the National Library and its collections.
Accompanied by Dr Maciej Szablewski, the Director’s Representative for International Relations and Head of the Reading Rooms Department, the delegation then visited the National Library’s reading rooms and learned about their operation and the organisation of access to the collections.
Jerzy Manikowski, Deputy Head of the Institute for the Conservation of Library Collections, presented the Institute’s activities and its mass conservation programme. Ada Lewandowska, Head of the Digital Collections Department, outlined the digitisation process carried out at the National Library, with particular emphasis on the Patrimonium project now under way.
