Love your library? Nominate us for the City Paper's Best Of Charleston awards!

CHARLESTON, S.C. - The nomination period of the City Paper's Best of Charleston awards is coming to a close! If you love your library, here's a perfect chance to recognize us with some nominations!

There are 400 different categories, from best gourmet grocery store to best person to defriend, so finding the right categories for a CCPL nomination can be a little daunting. We've put together a list of possible categories.

Under Attractions and City

Best Building: For those of you who love your new libraries in Mount Pleasant and James Island, consider Wando Mount Pleasant Library or Baxter-Patrick James Island Library. 

Best Fundraising Event: THAT Big Book Sale. It's an annual event with tens of thousands of books, movies, and CDs -- and prices start as low as 25 cents! 

Best Place To Work: We host dozens of storytimes every month, pack the place with Star Wars cosplayers once a year, walk in the holiday parade (with Stormtroopers and Jawa), are surrounded by books and movies and we can take home for free... what could be better?!

Best Public Space: When we're not putting on 600 events a month, we're also providing space for your events. Church groups, book clubs, tutors and students, nonprofits, government groups, education groups, you name it!

Under Culture

Best Cultural Event: Black Ink. Every year we bring in dozens of authors and publishers and host panel discussions and a keynote from some of the biggest names in the book world -- Nikki Giovanni, Marcus Amaker, Kwame Alexander, and Terry McMillan.

Best Local Podcast: The Charleston Time Machine. Dr. Nic Butler's time machine won in 2019 and we're hoping to repeat as we head into the FOURTH YEAR of podcasting Charleston's history. If you love the Holy City's history, this is the podcast for your commute and workout.

Best Locally Produced Video: Meet Your Library. Every Monday we introduce you to an aspect of the library you might not know, from a profile on one of our many librarians, or a look at how the CCPL delivery team moves tens of thousands of materials every day around the 18 branches in Charleston County.

Under Politics and News

Best Local Twitter Feed: @ChasCoLibrary. Whether it's running down all the free events happening at your local library or sharing book lists and articles to give you a wide variety of things to read or even to show off all the non-book things you can check out at the library (hello, telescopes!), there's always something fresh on our timeline. 

Best Local Website: ccpl.org. If you're searching for books or movies, you can do that and reserve a copy instantly. If you're a researcher looking for your family's past, the South Carolina Room and Charleston Archive have decades of research available online. Just looking for something to do with the kids? The events calendar is packed with events that can be sorted by library branch, age group, and topic.

Best Place For Family Fun: the library! There's always something going on for everyone, or nothing but a quiet space if that's what you're into, from anime nights to Dungeons and Dragons games, storytimes for kids and adults to craft sessions. You can even 3D print a Baby Yoda. (We did it.) We have so much fun *inside* the library that we're exporting it now with pop up libraries all around the county and a CCPL On The Road van stopping at other events!  

You can sign up and vote at BestofCharleston.net.