The Daily Beast: “It would be understandable if, after taking in the ornate reading rooms and grand hallways of the St. Louis Central Library, you deemed your thirst for literary splendor sated. However, tucked into one of those walls is an elegant but easily missed double door underneath a broken pediment leading to a true treasure trove filled with items that would fetch eye-popping sums at auction. Fittingly, they are books. Not the greatest twist, I suppose, but these are not any old books. First editions of Palladio and Alberti as well as 16th century printings of Vitruvius—oh, and first editions of Piranesi etchings that once belonged to the House of Lords. All of these sit behind glass and wood cabinets in an English country house library hidden within the I-Am-America-Hear-Me-Roar Gilded Age splendor of the St. Louis Central Library—a combination that makes it the latest selection for our series, The World’s Most Beautiful Libraries…”