The ICAEW Library was founded in 1871 and celebrates its 150th anniversary in 2021
As one of the three largest and most important accountancy libraries in the world, the ICAEW Library collection draws researchers from far and wide.
For 150 years the ICAEW Library has been the only library to have comprehensively collected material in this sector, effectively creating a national library of accountancy. Today, the collection holds around 48,000 books and runs of around 1,000 journal titles.
The ICAEW Library has always held an important place in the profession, gathering material that would not have been collected by other libraries; donations from key figures in the profession; transfers of material from ICAEW departments and documents from the firms and key organisations in the sector. Some of the material held in the collection is not available anywhere else, not even at the British Library.
In this video, the head of our Library Collection and Curation team talks about the significance of the collection and shows us a visitor book that has seen continued use from the opening of the library in Chartered Accountants' Hall in 1893 through to the 21st century.
Although the collection is a remarkable source for research, the ICAEW Library continues to function as a practical working collection serving the everyday needs of the Chartered Accountants of today. Our users have access to a wide range of print and digital resources covering everything from academy accounts to the latest on data visualisation.