At a coffee hour I was chatting with a retired librarian who had worked at MLK and she mentioned how she didn’t like the building. In her opinion it was a bad, bad, bad building for a library. It might have been a perfectly good building for an office but not so for a library. Sorry but you can’t just stuff a bunch a books in any old building (even if it is a van der Rohe) and call it a perfectly functioning library. I think ALA, the American Library Association, has a subcommittee on library buildings that actually address the needs of libraries. I was happy to read in the Post that Susan Fifer Canby, UMD College of (Library and )Information Studies grad and 2004 Alumna of the Year is on the mayor’s library panel (I’m a ClIS grad too). I may saunter into one of the many series of public meetings to hear what the members of the panel have to say.
The Waltha Daniel’s library in Shaw. That is an ugly building with maintenance issues.
One thought on “Libraries”
Comments are closed.
I agree, the Watha T. Daniel branch is abysmal. Although I always did enjoy the Rachel Whiteread-esque frieze of books that encircle the facade. That doesn’t make up for anything, however, especially in its current state of abandonment. Does anyone know the timetable for the submission of designs for the new building?