The Alençon media library is part of a space dedicated to culture, the Carré de la dentelle, located in the heart of the city. It houses a written heritage unique in Normandy rich in 57,000 documents including 728 manuscripts (including 137 medieval), 26 incunabula, about 57,000 ancient books, glass plates, postcards. The Jesuit church, built at the end of the 17th century, is a remarkable building for its imperial-style structure crowned with a hexagonal bell tower. The books confiscated during the French Revolution were stored in this disused place of worship since the departure of the Jesuits in 1762, to serve as a library at the central school of the Orne in 1799. That same year, the architect Jean-Baptiste Delarue arranged the building by separating the nave transversely to create two rooms, one on the ground floor and the other on the first floor. In this space, the architect decorates the remarkable 18th-century oak woodwork and four marble columns from the Chartreuse du Val-Dieu (Perche). Administratively, the Alençon municipal library was created in 1803 by a government decree entrusting the preservation of the collections to the city.