Boone County Public Library (KY)
ARCHITECT: HBM Architects
THE CHALLENGE: Boone County Public Library has an embarrassment of riches: an old family farm on 50 acres on which to build a new 15,000-plus square foot library that replaces a 6,000 square foot facility. The population served by the new library—28,280 in the 2010 census—mostly families, is expected to reach more than 38,000 by 2020. Director Carrie Herrmann and her team want the library to be a hub of discovery and interaction that includes a business center, indoor and outdoor classrooms, and a green roof, as well as an amphitheater or performing arts space for larger programs, concerts, and more. They’d also like to build out the site with a senior activity center and an athletic complex that takes advantage of a strong partnership with Parks & Recreation. One major issue: Where to put the library?
THE BRAINSTORM: In order to give attendees a taste of the design process and boil down a collaborative effort that normally takes weeks, HBM’s Dan Meehan and Peter Bolek divided attendees among four tables and first assigned each to review the site and discuss where to place the library—and then decide on its general layout. Several groups set the library in the corner of a triangle where two roads meet to increase its visibility and make it accessible from the road by car and on foot—“like a billboard for the library,” said Herrmann. Some proposed a dog run in the triangle, too. Even if the athletic center, amphitheater, etc., can’t be built at the same time, it’s important to site them on the plan, said Bolek, to show that the library site can bring much more than a library. For the building itself, suggestions included lots of windows to emphasize the natural setting, an entry through a café andvending area, a business center with its own entry, numerous electrical outlets for teens to charge their tablets, and a reading garden and early literacy outdoor “story walk” for young children. As Meehan noted, the breakout highlighted how valuable a similar event could be to kick off a library project and engage the community.—Francine Fialkoff
Marin County Free Library (San Rafael, CA)
ARCHITECT: MSR
THE CHALLENGE: In collaboration with the school district and other community partners, Marin County Free Library will embark on a new main building project: a traditional library that encompasses an expanded role as a formal education provider. The library district currently has ten branch libraries throughout the county but lacks a central library. Working with a nine-acre parcel, with close proximity to schools, housing, and mass transit, the development must be a true community space for all patrons, as well as an innovative learning center.
THE BRAINSTORM: Traci Lesneski, principal at MSR, and Sarah Jones, director of Marin County Free Library, urged participants to think outside the box on this new build. MSR divided attendees into three working groups, focused on three main areas: partners, place, and programs. Building on partnerships already made with nearby schools, participants also encouraged the library to include tech industry pioneers as partners to support experiential learning and a technology-rich environment for patrons of all ages. With a blank canvas on which to put the facility on the huge site, MSR’s Byoungjin Lee facilitated discussion on placement, taking into consideration parking, walkability, driving patterns, and views, as well as the property’s proximity to commuter rails, major roadways, and housing developments. With such a large site, the library can provide services outside of the building, such as a book return and book vending machines near the train station, along with ample green space. The third group, on programs and design, set aside spaces for outdoor play and reading, innovation and learning rooms, and teen and tween areas, with several entrances for different patron groups, providing a welcoming environment for everyone.—Stephanie Ham
Lexington–Henderson County Everett Horn Public Library (TN)
ARCHITECT: Hastings Architecture Associates, LLC
THE CHALLENGE: With just 6,000 square feet to deliver library services to more than 28,000 people, the Everett Horn Public Library is looking to do much more in a new 16,000–18,000 square foot building. Director Crystal Ozier brought along several trustees who helped give perspective and eagerly joined the conversation. The wish list for the new facility is representative of the dynamism of libraries today, complete with a Maker space, outdoor Wi-Fi courtyard, and comforts such as a sitting room with a fireplace and an accessible green roof for positive environmental impact and wow.
THE BRAINSTORM: After setting the stage, including a brief review of the major trends influencing culture and libraries now, Hastings architects David Powell and Mike Leonard (standing l.–r., photo above) used imagery of a potential site to help the group explore priorities such as creating visibility in the neighborhood, maximizing the lot’s green nature (possibly preserving an existing stand of trees), and enhancing walkability, with powerful needs such as the ever-important placement of parking—and that’s just on the outside. Powell illustrated the developing concepts, with the building set in a corner of the site with two welcoming fronts (one to the street and the other to the green space), via layers of drawings on translucent paper that allowed flexible review and revision as the creativity flowed.—Rebecca T. Miller
Normal Public Library (IL)
ARCHITECT: OPN Architects
THE CHALLENGE: To balance patrons’ desire for a suburban library with elected officials’ desire to situate the new facility in the more urban context of Uptown Normal, an area that has recently seen more than $80 million in investment and won several awards. The vision is to design a civic icon in a beautiful civic landscape, one that will offer traditional library services to its many patrons from academia, as well as innovative new services and access to emerging tech. Ample space is needed for highly used youth programming, collections, collaborations for all ages, programming of all sizes, including large-scale events, and the ability to grow and adapt with the community.
THE BRAINSTORM: After OPN Architects led a consideration of the pros and cons of the suburban vs. urban site options, in spite of patrons’ preference for the suburban venue, the attendees universally preferred the more urbanized location, in part because of its greater accessibility to public transportation. A hands-on design exercise using blocks and other props followed, not only in siting the library building itself but in city planning more broadly: the breadth of the Uptown Normal redevelopment plan and the early stage of its implementation allowed attendees to place not only the library building itself but also the roads, houses, and offices surrounding it. Three separate breakout groups converged on a plan that would place a multilevel parking structure next to railroad tracks to minimize noise pollution. They all chose to center the library in the middle of the available acreage, fronting on green space, to allow for views, light, and spillover of outdoor programming in cooperation with the parks department, particularly in an outdoor amphitheater, and to locate houses, residential apartment buildings, and offices further out, along with a grocery store and, of course, more parking. Among the finer points considered once those baselines were established were whether streets should front the library, for maximum accessibility and to turn the vista of the library into a visual focal point for the town as a whole, or lie further out (or become pedestrian- and bike-only) for safety. Also debated were the placement of the book drop, a possible addition of bike parking, and the security and staffing benefits of a single entrance vs. multiple points of approach and entry.—Meredith Schwartz
Orangeburg County Library (SC)
ARCHITECT: Margaret Sullivan Studio
THE CHALLENGE: Despite dated buildings and an aging and increasingly impoverished population, Orangeburg County Library (OCL) has developed excellent programming, especially in the arts, that excites kids and inspires adults. Participants come from across the region, and the high use is wearing out the existing buildings from carpet to computers. The demand for youth education opportunities, as demonstrated by the popularity of the library’s programs, is countywide and stretches beyond the walls of the library. Orangeburg seeks to expand its main building from 20,000 to 120,000 square feet to enable further the kind of hands-on learning it’s already supporting, but it doesn’t want to stop there.
THE BRAINSTORM: Margaret Sullivan Studio, led by Margaret Sullivan and Lyna Vuong, with Orangeburg County Library director Anna Zacherl and youth services librarian Jessica Nuckolls, has boldly reimagined a community conversation where the library spans the entire Orangeburg downtown, through dedicated services featured across a variety of spaces. Participants were urged to consider what kind of community they wanted to live in, thus envisioning a new Orangeburg County Library based on its services, impact, and ability to nurture the well-being of both communities and individuals. To do so, they were led through customer journeys that highlighted the services needed to shape downtown Orangeburg’s future, such as support for restorative justice, entrepreneurship, early childhood learning, positive relationships with law enforcement, and engagement in the creative arts. Participants listened to users’ stories and placed them along the most likely path they would take to find the needed services. In the process, they helped define the library’s role. Kids could engage in community service by gaining business skills through library-hosted programs featuring local entrepreneurs. Young mothers could continue their education through after-school library programming and get child care through partnerships with the local Head Start, with each imagined service reflecting existing library services elevated to a communitywide level of commitment and collaboration. Through this vision, participants reinforced the idea that the library is not confined to a building but is truly embedded in the community through expertise, resource provision, and core literacy development.—Emily Puckett Rodgers
All photos by Kevin Henegan