Every other year, representatives from the AIA and the American Library Association gather to celebrate the finest examples of library design by architects licensed in the U.S. The 2005 AIA/ALA Library Building Awards honor eight disparate projects, ranging in size from an architecture school library to the central facility for a major city. All share successful resolution of their patrons’ needs into harmonious and beautiful designs.

Arcadia University Landman Library, Glenside, Pa., by R.M. Kliment & Frances Halsband Architects, for Arcadia University
This design, in response to a competition for an addition to a university library, placed a new wing at the south face of the existing library. The resulting new, curved limestone building forms a distinctive presence at the heart of the campus and accommodates 150,000 volumes; a multimedia collection; the college’s archives; study seating for 300 in reading rooms, carrels, and groups rooms; multimedia classrooms; and the trustees room. The library strives to provide a variety of spaces and places for reading and study, with controlled daylighting and campus views, including a two-story-high reading room on the second floor that extends the full width of the building and looks out over the campus green. The circulating collection, housed on three floors in the older portion of the building, is adjacent to the study areas and a small café.
Photo © Cervin Robinson.

Austin E. Knowlton School of Architecture Library—The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio, by Mack Scogin Merrill Elam Architects with associate architect Wandel and Schnell Architects, for the Ohio State University Austin E. Knowlton School of Architecture
When considering this library as part of the program for their school of architecture, the faculty wanted to create an information and knowledge resource that also could serve as a reflective space away from the work environment of the design studios. This two-story glass-box, book-lined “room” accommodates 30,000 volumes and seating for 70 people in 40 table seats and 30 lounge chairs—each designed by a famous architect or designer. The library has an ample circulation desk with a closed reserve area, staff offices, workroom and storeroom, copy room, reference and journal areas, digital library, and rare book room. With “reading rooms” at either end—and library services in the middle—the staff interacts easily with the users and maintains control of the space. Located at the end of the building’s circulation system, overlooking a roof garden, the library is both very visible and removed from the major action of the building. As a small indication of the library’s success, it drew more than 20,000 visitors in its first three months of operation while serving a population of 750.
Photo © Timothy Hursley.

Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, Brookline, by Loysen + Kreuthmeier Architects, for the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh
The architects were charged with turning a nondescript, two-story concrete block with a zero lot line into a dynamic storefront library. The program called for doubling the library’s space, which included expanding the children’s department and adding an internet café, popular library, and “self-help” stations. Daylighting the windowless building proved the greatest design challenge, the architects say. A new interior lining peels away from the rigid concrete shell and, with the addition of a light wall, allows natural light from skylights and clerestories to penetrate the spaces. To transform the low-ceiling basement into a delightful children’s library, plaster ceilings tilt fancifully to fit HVAC equipment. Although the library has doubled in size, the new building, which has applied for LEED™ certification from the U.S. Green Building Council, has a zero increase in energy consumption over the old building.
Photo courtesy of the architect.

The Georgia Archives, Morrow, Ga., by Hellmuth, Obata + Kassabaum, for the Development Authority of Clayton County
A highly specialized government entity, quartered in 17 stories of a dark, monolithic building in Atlanta, asked the architects to create a new building that would redefine the visibility of their mission to the public. The architect’s first major intention was to design around how the organization works. On a separate but parallel track, the second major intention centered on designing for how visitors are received and screened for security purposes and how they may enjoy the education, research, and cultural opportunities presented. Operations and public access are designed to be separate, meeting only at specific, secure points. To supplement this technically rigorous program, the architects sited the building to preserve existing stands of trees and the site’s natural contours. Additionally important is the building’s pervasive natural light, tempered with high-performance glass to eliminate UV penetration, sunscreens, and porches.
Photo courtesy of the architect.

Harry Elkins Widener Memorial Library Renovation, Cambridge, Mass., by Einhorn Yaffee Prescott Architecture & Engineering PC, for Harvard University
This 1915 library, designed by Horace Trumbauer, sits at the geographical and intellectual heart of the university. In renewing the building for the 21st century, the project called for a renovation that would “simultaneously redefine the academic research library in programmatic and technical terms without losing the aura, comfort, and connection to tradition.” The first phase of the project entailed upgrading and modernizing the building system infrastructure and the original 10-floor self-supporting stack structure and library support spaces. New systems were threaded through the stacks, and the architects “found” space within two large light wells for new mechanical space, staff work areas, and two skylighted reading rooms. The second phase involved restoration of the historic public and reading spaces, in which existing features and room finishes were preserved whenever possible.
Photo © Peter Aaron/ESTO Photographics.

Issaquah Public Library, Issaquah, Wash., by Bohlin Cywinski Jackson, for the King County Library System
This new 15,000-square-foot library offers its hometown an expansion and modernization of library services in a more prominent and centralized location in the historic downtown core. The cedar-sided structure used an exaggerated building height to meet both the library’s programming needs of one level and the city code’s call for multifamily urban structures. A trellis and canopies help maintain human scale at the street level. On the corner of the site is a large covered area, or agora, that serves as a sheltered gathering place and marks the entrance to the building. Activity in the library’s multipurpose room, adjacent to the agora, is visible to the street. Doors open to the outside for special events. Entering the building from the agora, one passes through a wood-lined lobby and under a pair of tilted columns into the main space. Additional round columns taper slightly as they rise to meet the wood-lined ceiling. Light filters in the clerestory windows to highlight a delicate metal truss at the spine of the building.
Photo © Fred Housel.

Salt Lake City Public Library, Salt Lake City, by VCBO Architecture LLC, with design architect Moshe Safdie and Associates, for the Salt Lake City Public Library
This 200,000-square-foot facility is part of an ambitious program by the library to double its space for collections, establish a landmark in the city’s civic core, and create a lively interactive public space currently missing in the downtown area. The new library features a triangular main building, adjacent rectangular administration building, glass-enclosed “urban room,” and public piazza. Its reading galleries, which replace the traditional formal reading room, accommodate the “community of readers” in intimate spaces that are private yet visually connected to magnificent exterior views. The library’s sloped and curving wall has become an icon for the city, and the shops and food establishments at its base weave the site together. The wall also defines a connection to the city’s former library, which will become an arts and science center. The library’s roof garden offers spectacular views of the city and surrounding mountains. The library also is a 2004 national AIA Honor Award for Architecture recipient.
Photo © Timothy Hursley.

Seattle Central Library, Seattle, by a joint venture of OMA/LMN (Office for Metropolitan Architecture and LMN Architects), for the Seattle Public Library
The design goal for this library was to redefine the library as an institution no longer exclusively dedicated to the book, but as an information story in which all forms of media—new and old—are presented equally and legibly. Unlike traditional libraries, Seattle Central Library is organized into spatial compartments that are dedicated to and equipped for specific duties. Each platform is a programmatic cluster that is architecturally defined and equipped for maximum performance. The spaces between the platforms function as trading floors where librarians inform and stimulate. The library’s unique “book spiral” addresses the ongoing problem of subject classification. For example, in 1920 the library had no classification for computer science, but by the early 1990s the section had exploded. Using the Dewey Decimal System, the architects arranged the collection in a continuous ribbon—running from “000” to “999”—the subjects form a coexistence that approaches the organic. Each evolves relative to the others, occupying more or less space on the ribbon, but never forcing a rupture. The library also garnered a 2005 national AIA Honor Award for Architecture.
Photo © Pragnesh Parikh.

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