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Perpetual Plaques

A plaque is not an obituary. It is a short record of who someone is and what they care about, kept where the people they recognise can find it. Most plaques here belong to people who are very much alive.

Start a plaque
A stone wall of brass plaques under small lamps, keepsakes on narrow shelves below them, and a tall window onto a snowy lake at sunset
The hall of plaques · generated image

On the wall

A small red radio opened up on a wooden windowsill, a screwdriver beside it, a stack of exercise books and a mug, snowy spruces outside

Catalogue number M-000001Perpetual PlaquePractice

Lin Qiuyun

Thirty-one years of maths, and radios.

Behind the warden: 1 letter1 place to go1 badge

M-000002

This space is yours.

Free. Stop and come back any time.

Hang your own here →

How to write a plaque

  1. A name or a pen name, and one line: what they are known for.
  2. Behind the warden: a letter, a story, where a keepsake is and who to ask.
  3. Questions only the right people could answer: a room number, a nickname, a street.
  4. Lamps are not likes. Only people the warden recognises can light one.

Start a plaque →

Consent on file A plaque for someone else needs their consent, or, for someone who has died, their close family’s. It carries this stamp where everyone can see it, and anyone named can ask for it to come down.

Precedents in the Open Stacks

People have set plaques for each other, and for themselves, for a long time. These are on our shelves, free to read.

  • Catalogue number 008001 Apollo 11 Lunar Plaque NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) 19691 min
  • Catalogue number 008011 EpitaphFranklin’s Epitaph for Himself Benjamin Franklin 17281 minNo. 42
  • Catalogue number 008020 PosteritatiTo Posterity Petrarch (Francesco Petrarca) Franciscus Petrarca 13511 minEN