Good time for book swapping
Warragul residents Cathy Cooper and Anna Miron’s idea to introduce a “book swap” box at the start of 2020 could not have come at a better time for avid Warragul readers.
With council and school libraries facing gathering restrictions this year the Cason Crescent Book Swap has provided an easy outdoor spot for residents to share their favourite books from classic literature to children’s books and everything in between.
The book swap box is set on a fence facing the small reserve off Cason Crescent in the south of the Warragul. Also known as “Street Libraries”, book swaps are designed to increase literacy and book recycling by encouraging people to “bring a book and take a book”.
Cathy and Anna were inspired to bring the idea to their neighbourhood after seeing examples in Batemans Bay and Melbourne in recent years. In January they engaged Anna’s husband Bernard to build the first prototype and stocked it with books from their own collections.
Cathy started a Facebook page for the box and tagged a few neighbours. From that point on the project has been a success - so much so that Bernard was engaged to build a bigger box to house the increasing number of books being swapped. “I think with people spending a lot of time at home they have had more time to just sit down and read,” Bernard said.
Cathy has been pleasantly surprised by the book swap’s popularity. “It’s been incredible how people have embraced it and how often the books in the box are turned over,” she said.
Cathy thinks that people being forced to stay at home more during the last six months has added to the book swaps popularity, adding “I think with families doing a lot of walking together during the lockdowns more and more people have seen it and started using it.”
Bernard and Anna have seen the popularity of the box firsthand. “I saw someone drive up close to the park, get out and swap a book over, so more and more people have obviously heard of it,” said Anna.
There are close to 2000 book swaps across Australia. As well as the Cason Crescent Book Swap, there are other book swap boxes in Mills Road Warragul, the Community Garden at Eastern Park as well as one in Drouin.