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It would be interesting to know whether the collection is worth the money spent on housing it....
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davem,
That's probably true, if you're judging the worth of a collection in terms of dollars. Some people who collect are in it for financial reasons, but for others the money really has little bearing. If someone is crazy enough to build an odd structure like this (whether you like the thing or not....it's definitely out of the ordinary), they must be doing this for reasons other than pure monetary worth. Frankly, a cottage of that type does not look very secure (unless it's part of a large gated estate with guards prowling at the entrance and along the walls). If the goal was to provide a secure environment to protect a valuable financial investment, that's probably not the setting a person would choose, even if they had boatloads of money at their disposal. Someone has to be a bit dotty...in love with the books themselves and what they represent....to build such a strange sanctuary for them.
I personally don't have any problems with a collector sitting on his books and keeping them in the private domain. Most books have multiple copies and it's generally true that a special collections somewhere does own a copy. Even with an extremely rare item like Philologists, there are at least a few other copies(13?) floating around. What does bother me is when someone sits on historical manuscripts....a source that is unique. I am surprised at how often Tolkien letters turn up on ebay. Every time I see one, I make a copy of the text. Most are nothing special, but there have been some, which throw light on some question or problem. I hate to see those things gobbled up dropping off the public map.