The Pao Yue-kong Library, Campus Collections, and the Palace Museum × PolyU Chinese Textile Centre

The library system of The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU) centres on a single building: the Pao Yue-kong Library, located at the heart of the Hung Hom campus. It serves as the central library for a university of applied sciences, with collections weighted towards PolyU's signature disciplines — engineering, design, hotel and tourism, nursing, and business. This article focuses on the library's history, naming, collection size, and special collections. PolyU has no independent public museum of the kind that CUHK's Art Museum constitutes, and on-campus exhibitions are mainly carried by the library's digital collections, university archives, and School of Design displays, covered in the "On-Campus Exhibitions and Museums" section below, with explicitly marked "not found" items where applicable. A final section is devoted to the Chinese Textile Centre established jointly by PolyU and the Hong Kong Palace Museum.

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# 1. History of the Library and Its Naming

# 1.1 From Hong Kong Polytechnic Library to Pao Yue-kong Library

The PolyU library has evolved in step with the institution's upgrading trajectory. The following timeline is drawn from the English Wikipedia article "Pao Yue-kong Library" (whose account agrees with the library's own public materials):

# 1.2 The Namesakes: Sir Yue-Kong Pao and Pao Siu-loong

Sir Yue-Kong Pao (包玉刚, 1918–1991), whose ancestral home was Zhenhai, Ningbo, Zhejiang, was one of the twentieth century's most significant Chinese shipping magnates; his Worldwide Shipping Group was at one time among the world's largest private shipowners. The PolyU library was named after him in 1995 in recognition of the Pao family's donation (per the English Wikipedia article "Pao Yue-kong Library").

Pao Siu-loong (包兆龙, 1900–1982) was Sir Yue-Kong's father. Across the named-donation landscape of Hong Kong universities, the Pao family has frequently had different facilities named after "Yue-Kong Pao" and "Pao Siu-loong" respectively (e.g., the "Pao Siu-loong Building" at HKU, the "Pao Sui-loong Library" at Shanghai Jiao Tong University).

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# 2. Building and Facilities

Per the English Wikipedia article "Pao Yue-kong Library" (consistent with the library's own public materials):

The collections are distributed across several floors (per the library's collections page^※): books are housed on 6/F, 5/F, 4/F, 3/F, and G/F; serials (journals, newspapers) on G/F; audiovisual materials, course reserves, and seven-day-loan items on P/F; with separate collections for standards, university archives, and a remote store for low-use material.

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# 3. Collection Size (Facts & Figures 2024/25)

The figures below follow the library's official Facts & Figures page (2024/25 basis), verified June 2026.

Per the Pao Yue-kong Library Facts & Figures page^※:

Non-book material of various kinds (same page):

A note on the figures: PolyU's collections are dominated by electronic resources — over 8.1 million e-books and over 255,000 e-journal titles, far exceeding the roughly 1.1 million physical volumes in the library. The "Total Library Holdings" figure of 10,284,711 is the page's stated aggregate, encompassing all of the above print, electronic, and audiovisual material. Figures shift year to year; always check the year when citing.

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# 4. Special Collections and Digital Collections

PolyU's special collections are smaller in scale than those of older comprehensive universities, but they have notable strengths in Cantonese popular culture, oral history, and university archives — local and institutional themes — much of it made openly available through digital platforms.

# 4.1 Rare Books and University Collection

• Rare Book Collection: preserves valuable and rare books in Chinese or Western languages, typically irreplaceable, scarce, unique, or otherwise research-worthy material (per the library's Rare Book Collection page^※). The digital collections portal also features a dedicated "Rare Books on China and East Asia" theme (per the library's digital collections page).
• University Collection: holds historical material documenting the University's development, as well as publications of its academic, research, and administrative units and of individual staff members (per the library's University Collection page^※).

# 4.2 Digital Collections Portal

Per the library's digital collections page^※, the Digital Collections Portal is the gateway to the following digital content: special- collection rare books, lyric manuscripts, oral history interviews, and digital humanities projects. Standouts include:

• Cheng Kok-kong's Lyric Manuscript Collection (Cheng Kok-kong's Lyric Manuscript^※): original lyric manuscripts of Cheng Kok-kong (born 1944), one of Hong Kong's best-known Cantopop lyricists, whose works include such evergreen hits as "Tomorrow's Promises Today" (明日话今天) and "Chance Encounter" (偶遇). Cheng was among the signature lyricists of the Cantopop golden age of the 1970s and 80s. The collection digitises his manuscripts and makes them searchable and browsable through the Digital Collections Portal — a valuable primary source for the study of Hong Kong's local popular culture, and a natural fit with the School of Design's and Faculty of Humanities' interest in local cultural studies.
• Oral History: one of the digital humanities projects, comprising oral history recordings/interviews.
• Digital Image Database and other digital humanities projects.

# 4.3 Institutional Repository: PolyU Institutional Research Archive (PIRA)

PIRA (PolyU Institutional Research Archive) is the University's online platform for actively collecting and disseminating the research and scholarly output of the PolyU community (per the library's collections page^※). According to that page, it has collected over 64,000 journal and conference papers published by PolyU staff, and complies with the Research Grants Council's (RGC) "open access policy" archiving requirements — the RGC requires journal papers arising from funded research to have an open-access version deposited within 12 months of publication. The repository thereby raises the global visibility and citation rate of PolyU research and provides a free search channel for researchers outside the University. The portal also includes:

• e-Theses: full-text images of the University's doctoral and master's theses;
• Outstanding Work by Students: award-winning or socially impactful student work across disciplines;
• the Digital Collections Portal (above).

The broader landscape of PolyU publishing and journal editing (PolyU Press, external journals edited by faculty, etc.) is covered in〈Publishing, Academic Journals, and Digital Education & IT〉and is not repeated here.

# 4.4 Provenance of the Special Collections: Rare Books on East Asia, 1704–1922, and the Hong Kong Photography Collection

A batch of rare books in the Rare Book Collection consists of works about China and East Asia, mostly published in Western countries between 1704 and 1922 — a record of how the West understood and presented China and East Asia from the early eighteenth to the early twentieth century, of particular value to research on Sino-Western exchange, sinology, and publishing history. The library is progressively digitising these volumes and making them available to researchers through the Digital Collections Portal.

The library also runs the "Hong Kong Photography Collection" project, which, per the library newsletter^※, aims to photograph and preserve iconic buildings and streetscapes across Hong Kong, documenting the city's changes since the 1990s. The project takes the Pao Yue-kong Library beyond its core university-library remit into a public role in preserving local cultural heritage — and it chimes with the urban concerns of PolyU's design and architecture disciplines. In a Hong Kong being rebuilt at speed, many 1990s buildings and street scenes have already vanished; for a university library to archive these images systematically is a quiet but significant act of cultural preservation.

The Digital Collections Portal was launched in 2020^※ as a central showcase for the library's digitised special collections and local cultural holdings. The library also subscribes to international art-image resources such as JSTOR Artstor^※ — per the library's database description, Artstor is JSTOR's interdisciplinary image collection, containing more than 2 million rights-cleared images from around the world and searchable on the same platform as JSTOR's journals, books, and other primary sources.

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# 5. On-Campus Exhibitions and Museums

# 5.1 The Current Situation

PolyU does not have a separately branded public museum centred on Chinese antiquities, as CUHK's Art Museum or HKU's University Museum and Art Gallery are. Its on-campus exhibition and cultural spaces mainly take the following forms:

• The library's digital collections and university archives (see Section 4), opened up through the digital portal and the University Collection;
• Design, textile, and fashion exhibitions: PolyU has a School of Design and a School of Fashion and Textiles (per PolyU Scholars Hub^※), and both schools regularly hold exhibitions of staff and student work. These, however, tend to be periodic events hosted in school spaces; no public documentation has been found of a permanently branded "museum" in operation.

# 5.2 "Not Found" / "Not Applicable" Notes

• Independent public museum / art museum: Not found (the "art museum" institutional type does not apply at PolyU).
• Standing textile/design museum: No official documentation of a separately established, permanently branded museum has been found; the relevant collections and displays are scattered across the teaching and exhibition activities of the School of Fashion and Textiles and the School of Design. This article accordingly keeps to what can be verified and does not speculate on scale.
• University history room: PolyU has a "University Collection" and digital archival material, but no clearly documented official page for a separate physical "university history room / museum" open to the public on a standing basis. This article therefore records only the library's "University Collection" as verified; a physical history room is marked to be confirmed.

Wherever the above "not found / to be confirmed" marks appear, they result from the fact that public searches could not directly confirm the item. In line with this site's editorial discipline, such items are explicitly flagged: neither assumed to exist nor given invented scale or holdings.

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# 6. Library Services

# 6.1 Borrowing and Reference Services

The Pao Yue-kong Library's day-to-day services can be loosely grouped into four strands — borrowing, interlibrary loan, asking, and preparing:

• Borrowing: loan quotas and periods differ for undergraduates, postgraduates, and staff (per Library · Loan Privileges^※);
• Interlibrary Loan / Document Delivery (ILL/DD): material not held in the library can be borrowed from other UGC-funded university libraries in Hong Kong through the Hong Kong Academic Library Link (HKALL); journal articles, books, or book chapters may also be requested from overseas partner libraries (per Library · Interlibrary Loan Service^※);
• Reference consultation: Faculty Librarians offer one-on-one or small-group "research consultation" appointments covering search strategy development, resource identification and evaluation, search-query construction, and citation management (per Library · Research Consultation^※);
• Course Reserve: teaching staff may place required readings on short-loan or seven-day-loan shelves for students enrolled in the course to share (per Library · Course Reserves and Books on 7-day Loan^※).

# 6.2 Research Support Services

In recent years the Pao Yue-kong Library has developed a "research support" function in response to PolyU's rising research intensity:

• Research data management training: helping postgraduates and staff handle research data in line with RGC and journal requirements;
• Scholarly impact and citation analysis: training in databases such as Clarivate's Web of Science and Scopus, helping authors track citations and H-index;
• Open Access support: assisting with depositing research output in PIRA in line with open-access (OA) publishing policies;
• Subject Librarians: dedicated liaison librarians assigned by faculty/department, providing subject-specific literature search support.

# 6.3 Learning Spaces and Facilities

The library extension and revitalisation completed in 2022 markedly improved the learning experience:

• Sixth-floor extension: skylight daylighting as a design highlight, with generous space for self-study and discussion;
• Maker spaces: media production and 3D printing facilities on some floors;
• 24-hour reading room: for students who need to study through the night;
• Group discussion rooms: bookable, enclosed small rooms;
• Accessibility facilities: lifts, accessible entrances, and services for users with special needs;
• Silent/quiet zones: floors zoned to separate discussion from silent reading.

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# 7. The Library's "Applied Disciplines" Collection Profile

The PolyU library is not known for broad humanities holdings; its core strength lies in applied disciplines:

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# 8. The 2022 Extension and Revitalisation Project (Award-Winning)

Per the Wikipedia article "Pao Yue-kong Library"^※, the library's "Extension and Revitalization Project" received The Architect's Newspaper's "Best of Design Award" 2022 — an annual design-recognition honour awarded by an international architecture media outlet.

Design features of the project include:

• Sixth-floor extension (above 5/F): a new floor added on top of the original six-storey building, centred on skylights and open platforms;
• Indoor–outdoor integration: linking the adjoining outdoor terrace with the sixth-floor interior to create a semi-open study environment rare on campus;
• Sustainable design: natural daylighting reduces artificial-lighting energy use;
• Flexible learning spaces: rapidly reconfigurable furniture and partitions supporting solo study, group discussion, exhibitions, and other functions.

The extension is part of PolyU's strategy to "optimise the learning experience" — with residential places in short supply, the library has been systematically invested in and upgraded as a "second living and learning space."

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# 9. Digital Library and Remote Access

As electronic resources overtook physical holdings from the 2020s onward, the Pao Yue-kong Library's "Digital Library" function has become increasingly prominent:

• Off-campus access: via VPN or EZproxy authentication on PolyU accounts, all staff and students can access e-journals and databases from outside campus;
• Core databases: Web of Science, Scopus, SciFinder, Engineering Village, Compendex, CAB Abstracts, PubMed, Emerald Insight, JSTOR, and others;
• Live chat reference: the library website provides an "Ask a Librarian" instant-consultation entry point;
• RFID self-service borrowing: physical books are borrowed and returned via RFID self-service kiosks, reducing queues.

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# 10. Industrial Design Collections and On-Campus Display Spaces in Detail

PolyU's School of Design is a recognised top-tier design education institution in Hong Kong and the region. Per the School of Design website^※, the School's scope covers industrial design, visual communication, interior and architectural design, and design thinking, and it holds exhibitions fairly frequently: the annual Graduation Show displays the final projects of undergraduate and taught-postgraduate students (product-design prototypes, brand visuals, and spatial installations) and is generally open to the public; award-winning Red Dot and iF Design Award works by PolyU students and staff are occasionally shown in campus spaces; and the School has a dedicated Design Gallery used for staff and student work, touring exhibitions, and international collaborations (the scale of the "standing collection" and frequency of public opening follow the School's announcements for the year in question — this article does not fix the number of exhibits).

Other display spaces across the PolyU campus: the Jockey Club Innovation Tower, designed by Zaha Hadid, hosts some School of Design activities, and its corridors and common areas regularly show student design work (architectural details in〈05-campus · The Jockey Club Innovation Tower〉); the School of Design collaborates academically with the Hong Kong Design Institute (HKDI) in Kwun Tong, with some exhibitions touring between the two schools; and the Pao Yue-kong Library display corner periodically runs small exhibitions in the library's public areas covering special collections, university history artefacts, and academic themes.

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# 11. Digital Resources and E-Learning Tools

# 11.1 Core Databases at a Glance

The Pao Yue-kong Library currently subscribes to more than 453 databases (per the library's Facts & Figures 2024/25 page^※), covering PolyU's major disciplines:

The above are representative; actual subscription status is subject to the library's current holdings and may change year to year.

# 11.2 E-Books

Per the library's Facts & Figures 2024/25^※, the library holds over 8.1 million e-books. Major platforms include ProQuest Ebook Central (academic e-books across PolyU disciplines), ScienceDirect (Elsevier's science, engineering, and medical e-books and journals), and O'Reilly / Safari Books Online (e-books in computer science, programming, and data science, subscribed in response to the needs of the Faculty of Computer and Mathematical Sciences). Multimedia platforms include Kanopy (streaming documentaries and academic films) and Alexander Street Press (performing arts and music audiovisual resources).

# 11.3 Learning Management System and Library Integration

PolyU uses Blackboard (now Anthology/Blackboard Ultra) as its primary learning management system (LMS). The library's Course Reserve function is integrated with Blackboard: teaching staff can link directly to e-journal articles or e-book chapters within the system, so students can access them without leaving the course page. In addition, the library's Subject Librarians accept class bookings for literature-search training workshops. The overall architecture of digital education platforms (LEARN@PolyU, IT Services coordination, etc.) is covered in〈Publishing, Academic Journals, and Digital Education & IT〉and is not repeated here.

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# 12. Makerspaces and Library Technology Facilities

# 12.1 Makerspaces: An Overview

The Library Extension and Revitalisation (LER) Project was approved by the Legislative Council in July 2020. It added a sixth floor atop the existing building (a net operational area increase of about 2,080 sq m) and revitalised approximately 14,600 sq m of existing floors from the ground floor to the fifth. Per the library's LER project page^※, the new sixth floor opened on 4 July 2022, with the full project expected to be completed in the fourth quarter of 2023.

Digital creation and physical making facilities are concentrated in i-Space, on the third and fourth floors of the library's north wing. Per the library's i-Space introduction^※, the space is organised into three zones — "Inspiration," "Ideation," and "Implementation" — and the Implementation zone houses a Digital Makerspace and a Digital Visualisation Room. Per the i-Space facilities list^※, available facilities include:

• Audiovisual production studios: a One Button Studio, a multimedia production studio, and recording rooms supporting online course materials, interviews, 360-degree virtual-reality tours, and animation;
• 3D printing and 3D scanning: for students producing design models or research prototypes;
• Laser cutting/engraving and vinyl cutting: physical fabrication equipment;
• VR experience zone: virtual-reality equipment available for trial;
• Book scanning and large-format printing: for researchers handling and outputting material.

# 12.2 Computers and Software Resources

• Library computer terminals: more than 400 computers in the library (per the English Wikipedia article "Pao Yue-kong Library"), preloaded with academic and professional software including SPSS, MATLAB, AutoCAD, and Adobe Creative Cloud;
• Self-service printing/copying: printers and copiers on each floor, supporting A4/A3 and black-and-white/colour, billed to campus accounts;
• RFID self-service borrowing stations: located throughout the library, allowing physical books to be borrowed without queuing at a staffed counter.

# 12.3 Learning-Space Technology Upgrades (Post-2022)

The 2022 extension brought these upgrades to the library's floors:

Off-campus remote access (EZproxy/VPN) and the "Ask a Librarian" instant-consultation service are covered in Section 9 and are not repeated here.

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# 13. Frequently Asked Questions (Q&A)

Q1. Does PolyU have a "museum" in any real sense?

Strictly speaking, no. PolyU has no independently branded public museum, and its situation differs in kind from CUHK's Art Museum or HKU's University Museum and Art Gallery. The closest equivalents to museum functions are: ① the library's special and digital collections (Cheng Kok-kong's lyric manuscripts, rare books, university archives); ② the School of Design's graduation shows and gallery exhibitions (industrial design, visual communication); and ③ on-campus art display spaces (the Jockey Club Innovation Tower, etc.). All operate as exhibitions rather than as standing museums (per the library's collections page^※).

Q2. Can visitors from outside the University use the PolyU library or consult the special collections?

In general, the Pao Yue-kong Library primarily serves enrolled staff and students; external visitors must apply for a visitor's or admission pass to use the library in person. Electronic databases and most e-books require a PolyU account. The special collections (including rare books and manuscripts) must be contacted and booked in advance through the library's special collections unit, and consulting originals in person requires additional vetting. The digitised versions of Cheng Kok-kong's lyric manuscripts, however, are openly browsable by the public through the Digital Collections Portal without logging in (per the library's digital collections page^※).

Q3. Can students use the library's makerspaces directly?

Yes, but some equipment requires advance booking or induction workshops. 3D printers and media production equipment generally require registration before use; some precision equipment may only be operated independently by registered students after training. Application procedures follow the library's "Equipment Loan" announcements for the year in question.

Q4. Is the library open 24 hours?

The library has a 24-hour reading room, but its overall opening hours (including reference services and database terminals) are not round-the-clock. Normal service hours are roughly 8:30–22:00 on weekdays, reduced on weekends and public holidays, and may extend late into the night or to 24 hours during examination periods. Check the library's "Opening Hours" announcements for the current year.

Q5. Does the PolyU library share resources with other Hong Kong university libraries?

Yes. The PolyU library participates in JULAC (Joint University Librarians Advisory Committee), under which the eight UGC-funded university libraries in Hong Kong operate interlibrary loan (ILL) and cross-library reading services. Students holding a PolyU student card may apply for a visitor's pass to enter other member university libraries, and in some cases borrow their material (rules follow each library's annual agreements).

Q6. Why are Cheng Kok-kong's lyric manuscripts held at the PolyU library rather than the Hong Kong Heritage Museum?

According to the available records, Cheng donated the manuscripts to the PolyU library during or after his lifetime; the specific reasoning has not been set out in detail in official sources. Institutionally, the School of Design and the Faculty of Humanities have academic ties to local popular-culture research, and the library's digitisation capability ensures long-term preservation and open access — factors that likely lie behind the manuscripts' placement at PolyU. The digitised versions are openly available through the library's Digital Collections Portal^※, so researchers can consult them without visiting the library.

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# 14. The Palace Museum × PolyU: Joint Chinese Textile Centre

PolyU's textile expertise faces both the future (smart textile materials, see〈04-research · Materials and Textile Breakthroughs〉) and the past. In December 2024, per the PolyU press release^※ and the Hong Kong Palace Museum announcement^※, the Hong Kong Palace Museum (HKPM) and PolyU jointly launched the Joint Chinese Textile Centre — a "museum + university" pairing: the Palace Museum brings its collections and museological expertise, while PolyU contributes academic strength in textile technology, design, and the humanities (notably from the School of Fashion and Textiles, the School of Design, and the Faculty of Humanities).

The Centre's research foundation is the Chris Hall Collection of nearly 3,000 Chinese textile artefacts spanning successive dynasties. Per the Pulse@PolyU report^※, the collection's particular strengths include rank badges from the Ming and Qing dynasties — the woven or embroidered squares on officials' robes that indicated their wearer's rank, making them valuable physical evidence for the study of dress institutions and hierarchical culture — as well as religious textiles. The Centre's work spans research (studying Chinese textiles of successive dynasties from artistic, historical, and technological angles), teaching (PolyU develops teaching materials and offers courses in Chinese textile and silk history), training, public education, and academic publishing, and provides interdisciplinary resources for the Faculty of Humanities, the School of Fashion and Textiles, and the School of Design.

A defining feature of the Centre is that it aspires to more than "preserving history" — it pursues innovative application, turning research on China's historical textiles into resources for contemporary design, education, and cultural communication, in line with PolyU's applied, vocational motto 「開物成務」 ("to open up things and accomplish affairs"; see〈00-overview · Motto and Identity〉). PolyU develops "textiles of the future" such as smart sweat-wicking and solar textiles on one hand, and on the other collaborates with the Palace Museum to study nearly 3,000 "textiles of the past" — this two-way move of "facing the future while looking back at history" is precisely the depth of PolyU's fashion and textile disciplines (echoing〈01-academics · School of Fashion and Textiles〉).

Alongside the library's rare books on East Asia and the Hong Kong Photography Collection (Section 4), this Centre forms part of PolyU's contribution to "knowledge and cultural heritage preservation" — a university's worth lies not only in its research and rankings, but also in how it preserves, studies, and disseminates cultural heritage.

Source strength: Establishment of the Centre (Dec 2024), the two co-organisers, the Chris Hall Collection of nearly 3,000 pieces, and the Ming–Qing rank badges are all documented in the PolyU press release, the HKPM announcement, and Pulse@PolyU.

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