Many cultural places are being transformed through the mutations of digital world, reduced public financing and the rise of the knowledge-based economy.

This is the case of third places libraries, defined as places of sociability and encounter rather than areas strictly for book reading and learning. These libraries introduce additional uses not directly connected to knowledge, including public services, coworking spaces and even leisure activities – knitting, yoga, cooking… Like the Mériadek Library in Bordeaux, or Lezoux media library , third places libraries are centred on users, and prioritise to digital tools and new learning patterns, such as serious games and collaborative platforms.

Cultural science centres, like Medialab Prado in Madrid (Spain), Cap Sciences (Bordeaux, France) or Quai des Savoirs (Toulouse, France) are reinventing their mediation patterns ; they build them on collective intelligence methods (developed in living labs) and fast prototyping tools (fab labs).

These new generation centres propose multiple spaces with different social and functional dimensions, including interactive exhibition rooms, knowledge café, workshops, creativity rooms, and test rooms for digital devices. At the opposite of the diffusion of culture and knowledge politics towards the “general public”, everything is designed so the visitors can build in an active and ascendant way new knowledge, culture or creative devices. (https://theconversation.com/the-hypothesis-of-cultural-third-places-93509 ).