I don't like it. It will grow on me, if only from a Pavlovian association of the place with its contents. The librarians will be clever and thorough in mitigating its navigation problems by providing maps and signs. The Architecture, though, is maybe a fifth part an interesting try at a Machine for Information, maybe a fifth part actively stupid, and more than a fifth humorous because it's already so dated. It was instantaneously passé when the third Matrix movie was a disappointment.
The aesthetic dorkiness has its charming side, though. I'm fond of Seattle partly because we're a provincial, optimistic, overambitious, pratfall of a place; very homely, even when tremendously annoying. The library and the sports stadiums will be our cultural bookends to the fortunate 1990s, reminding us what we spent and what we thought would save us.
I also look forward to no-budget dystopian films being made in the library, with Blöödhäg soundtrack.
What specifically don't I like about it? From the outside, the pompous, looming approach on 4th, in which the entry has all the appeal of a pore. Seattle doesn't need to shade its streets, and the high overhang won't protect that door from much rain. (Next visit, I'll start on 5th and see if that feels better.) Then the navigation is hideously, hilariously bad, so that the librarians have already taped up (tidy and color-coördinated) copier notices explaining where to go and how to get out. There's all this whooptedo about the easy navigation and the spiral of books, but (postponing the question of whether the Dewey line is really how we access books) you don't walk in and meet the books, you walk into a sort of distant-concierge hotel lobby on 5th or a crowded industrial arrangement of dead ends on 4th. The lobby on 5th presents vast vertical space with no books. The children's and multilingual books are on floor 1; 2 isn't public; 3 is other fiction (all of it?); the spiral is floors 6 to 9. You don't get to see the spiral when you walk in (I didn't find a good overview of it anywhere). The building doesn't invite you into the knowledge of the ages, rather it does more to hide the books than I would have thought possible in an open-plan, glass-walled building.
I suppose many people will be more comforted by the "mixing chamber" combined reference and information desk than I am, and I am content in the expectation that the librarians will make a good thing of it and make it an abstract introduction to the Horn of Plenty. All that concrete isn't abstract, and I disdain it for disdaining that spiraling horn.
It isn't the modernism I dislike; I enjoyed the temporary library, which spent the interim years in an authentically construction-surfaced installation in a convention-center building.
Just plain dim details: the stairs in the book spiral are incredibly noisy. The boxed-in stairwells are of a different material and aren't noisy, so I suspect the noisy ones were chosen because they look cool. There are what seem to be water sprays (for fire suppression, I can't remember the name) that are boxed in most of 300°, by the glass wall of the escalators on one side and by their heavy brackets on the other. Maybe they pop out and wave tentacularly in event of a fire. The continuous ramp concrete floor of the spiral is ribbed with cast-in-place level supports for the bookcases , etc. Where there aren't bookcases, these 1" or 2" teeth extend into the corridor floor a few inches; enough for me to trip on, as the corridors are narrow enough that I hug the wall going around corners. The verticals next to these teeth are mostly sheetrock, e.g. boxes around supports or stairwells, and it's slipshod that the teeth and the sheetrock don't match.
The lower end of the purportedly-important Book Spiral has already been commented on by one of our newsweeklies; it stubs out without ceremony or explanation, facing yet another drop filled with I-beam supports (which are covered with rough black fire retardant, to bolster the cheap-SF-movie effect), with no way in or out visible. I don't like the top of the spiral much better; you finally pass the Special Collections which are in a glass-walled Don't Touch city. Again, an actively disinviting transition from finding materials to using them.
I'm dubious about whether this is really a "light-filled" library. There's a lot of inaccessible space with an angled glass wall above and below, and maybe this will bring in comfortable indirect light year-round, and maybe it will be a wearying greyness all winter. I like grey, I go west and wetter from here to relax, but a building to concentrate that would be a bit much even for me. I hope someone did extensive solar modelling.
I liked the floor in the multilingual section a lot. Making the organizational principle of the books the spine of the building is a pretty idea. I sort of like the perpetual keyhole views through the grid-skin. The book-transport system is cute. I, mmm, I hope I'm more cheerful on my next visit. I don't like not liking my library. (I love the Capitol Hill design, although I think it should have more room for books, and I was horrified when the roof leaked catastrophically last winter.) The popup power strips and wireless access at the study tables aren't as good as the stunning blue leather and brass scholar's fitments at the British Library Reading Room, but they are attempts at being as useful (I should check whether the desks are comfortable for non-computer work.)
Back to the Dewey spiral... There are good reasons why our book-ordering systems map to the number line, but I don't think that's a good map of how we use them. (I Am Not A Librarian. Ignorant Pontification Ahead. Not Much Worse Than Everything Else So Far, Though.) Trotting up and down the spiral, making constant use of the rubber markers in the floor, I really, really noticed that books on related subjects aren't usually next to each other in Dewey. The back-and-forth pattern in boring old rectangular stacks is okay because you don't have to go the length of each bookcase, and sometimes you luck out and everything is on the same physical corridor. So the perfect Library is arranged with an infinite number of petals, extensible as their subjects grow, but all opening to the student in the middle: the one corridor collapsed to a point: the one place we want a Panopticon. (The BLRR catalogue tried, eh? but the actual books were elsewhere. I wish I could find a picture of the desk furniture.)
A spiral could have the elevators as the single point, stretched out by mere physical necessity; but I don't think this one does. I didn't stop at every stop but the elevator mostly doesn't face books, that I recall.
Well. More later. May this embarrass me a decade from now when it's obvious that the library is the help and pride of the city.
So wrote clew in Cities. , Meta. | TrackBackThe societal norm is to go through a 'reaction' phase of a new building's unveiling, i give you some credit for that. If you are like most, you probably have only 'toured' the new central library as a spectacle once, instead of using it as the resource it has been designed to be. Unfortunately that surface taste didn't stop you from using cheap perfume to drape uninformed criticisms about it and post them on the internet. It seems like you might be fearful of the new library because it is something that is not familiar to you.. recognizable shades of a conservative worldview.
I never cease to be amazed at the delusional attitude carried by many 'seattlites' that 'we' are an 'optimistic, overambitious' city... Lets face it, Seattle is a relatively small city... 3.2million population metropolitan area.. compare with Rio Di Janeiro's 12 million, Moscow's 15million, NewYork's 22 million.. or how about Tokyo's 33million? Seattle openly has non-committal conservative attitudes toward architecture and the built environment. A good example of this is our lack of a mass transit system in place beyond the bus, despite an innovative start with one of the first monorails in the early 60's. Jump ahead to 2004.. what? no subway yet? no light rail yet? no monorail yet? new plans for a street car? Portland has made fools of us in this regard.
And architecture. Examples of strong work are few and far between in our beloved metropolitan area, much in part due to our backward-looking aesthetic world views and fear of committing to something not 'tried and tested.' How about stepping back a bit and looking at the Steven Holl designed art museum in Bellevue? A renowned international architect's work could do little to keep the art museum from closing in under a year due to low attendance.. partially blamed on "bellevuites" criticism of the art exhibits being "too liberal." But boy, the 'Hooters' across the parking lot is sure thriving... maybe the art museum should return to its original location: INSIDE THE MALL. Luckily for us, Bellevue is across a large body of water, but it still makes up our part of our metropolitan area. (Seattle alone is only a population of 560,000)
Returning to the issue at hand, before I begin to illuminate the library upon which your write-up fell onto, the most important thing to remember is that this library is a gift to the city that will likely be known as an important step in seattle's architectural growth and history, long after you and myself are gone.
you might find it interesting that the "aesthetic dorkiness" of the library was a result of (1) programatic functions & requirements being identified and isolated into five levels of stability (parking, staff, meeting, books, and headquarters), (2) four levels of instability (children's area, living room, mixing chamber, reading room), and then (3) being offset horizontally from each other in order to capture views of the surrounding context (elliot bay, mt. rainer, etc.) and to (4) create dynamic interstitial spaces for people to move through. The entire composition is wrapped in a open steel mesh that resists all lateral/seismic loads, while serving the primary vision: to be a democratic institution with transparency in form. The library was conceived to be a portal of information to serve the public, it is symbolic that it is visually open on all faces because it 'has nothing to hide.' Rem Koolhaas beat out 26 other competitors before winning the commission, and was fully endorsed in his process, methods, and results by the librarians who were responsible for hiring him. (Do a web search on Deborah Jacobs if you don't believe me). Furthermore, take into consideration Herbert Mushamp's quote (architectural critic of the New York Times): "In more than 30 years of writing about architecture, this is the most exciting new building it has been my honor to review." I could go on and on and bore you further, but I'll stop here and turn to (25) observations of your comments.
(1) "instantaneously passé when the third Matrix movie was a disappointment."- I think this comment speaks for itself.
(2)"The library and the sports stadiums will be our cultural bookends to the fortunate 1990s, reminding us what we spent and what we thought would save us." - Can you name for me some built works that have saved us or that could save us? Save us from what?
(3)"Bloodhag" would make a better soundtrack for your criticism.. the dystopian films would more likely select some seattle talent with a more ethereal, futuristic, forward-thinking, progressive sound to match the backdrop of the library.. maybe Lusine ( http://www.lusineweb.com/ ) or Bruno Prosanto ( http://www.undosounds.com/ )
(4) If you had any appretiation of structural technology you would be humbled by the 40ft canteliever over fourth avenue. "Seattle doesn't need to shade its streets" Can you show me a building downtown that doesn't shade the streets at some point during the daylight hours? You'd almost think some people might enjoy the shelter on rainy days maybe?
(5) "navigation is hideously, hilariously bad" -you may have noticed that primary means of circulation are clearly marked in an almost flourescent yellow in most places with descriptive, several ft. tall text indicating most areas. Not that it means anything to you, but Bruce Mau, internationally renowned graphic designer, was responsible for the graphics and wayfinding... it wasn't amateur hour. IN REVIEW, as you begin to actually USE the library over time for a purpose other that TOURING, I'd bet you will find it easy to navigate. Sorry, it was designed with more in mind that being a circular theme park. And for those wondering why there is no down escalator from the bottom of the book spiral, thank yourselves for not coming through with donations, as one was originally planned for, but removed due to budget cuts. Oh boo-hoo... I have to take an elevator or the stairs now. Travesty!
(6) "question of whether the Dewey line is really how we access books" YES, the Dewey line is really where we access the books.. the floor mats are movable so they can move with the book locations as the collection grows organically.
(7) "you don't walk in and meet the books" -RUBBISH... You DO walk in and meets the books.. on the 5th avenue floor the entire fiction collection is RIGHT THERE in the tall, open, naturally lit living room space... on 4th avenue you are "met" by the language library on the Anne Hamilton reversed text maple planked floor to the right and the childrens area to the left, books ALL AROUND.
(8) "lobby on 5th presents vast vertical space with no books" lest you missed #(7), THE ENTIRE FICTION COLLECTION IS ON THE FIFTH AVENUE FLOOR.. Gee, what to do with allll that open space and all those chairs to sit on.. maybe we should fill that space with book shelves to make it like our old library.
(9) "don't get to see the spiral when you walk in " -the book spiral is visible not only from the street, but from the living room when you walk in, also the mixing chamber, and from the seattle collection on the tenth (eleventh?) floor.
(10) "The building doesn't invite you into the knowledge of the ages, rather it does more to hide the books than I would have thought possible in an open-plan, glass-walled building." Yeah, the building's not inviting at all, being how dark it is, and how it didn't give any precedent to gathering spaces... there's nowhere to sit and reflect, no place to stand and get an overview of the building.. so claustrofobic... yeah the books are so hidden.. its like they were trying to hide the books. whats up with the 400 computers? I want me's access to da knowledge of the ages, damnit!
(11) "All that concrete isn't abstract, and I disdain it for disdaining that spiraling horn." ha...ahhahAHHAHAHAHHA!!! why is the concrete a threat? because your used to finished floors? wood? carpet? who said it was meant to be abstract? After several full-size mock-ups in a south seattle warehouse, this was the design preferred by people of all abilities (kids, elderly, wheelchairs, blind, etc.). The concrete you speak of is actually a topping slab several inches in depth. The concept behind keeping it gray and exposed was to have a mute palette throughout the bookspiral so the architecture wouldn't compete with the books as much, the concept was for the books to take precedent over all.
(12) "There are what seem to be water sprays (for fire suppression, I can't remember the name)" SPRINKLERS! those little ugly guys that help save lives in fires... required in most buildings.
(13) "Maybe they pop out and wave tentacularly in event of a fire" No, this isn't Matrix3... those little guts drape sheets of water against the glass in the event of a fire to give the precious, firefighter delivering glass elevator shaft the 2 hour fire rating that building code dictates.
(14) "these 1" or 2" teeth extend into the corridor floor a few inches; enough for me to trip on, as the corridors are narrow enough that I hug the wall going around corners." uh.. the corridors are standard width... no, you're not going to trip over the "teeth" unless you try as they do not encroach on the city of seattle accepted circulation space widths.. "hug the wall"?... c'mon...your reaching. Keep in mind that this book spiral displays almost 75% of the nonfiction collection on open stack... in comparrison to the old libraries 33%... this innovative book spiral also has the capacity to expand to almost 1.4 million books.. from the current 900,000.
(15) "the purportedly-important Book Spiral has already been commented on by one of our newsweeklies; it stubs out without ceremony or explanation" -I'm coming for that newsweekly next ;)
(16) "rough black fire retardant, to bolster the cheap-SF-movie effect" -uh, what color fire retardant would be acceptable to you? white? pink? blue? You know that fireproofing is required so the heinous steel beams don't sulk like string cheese in the event of a fire? right? At least it kind of goes away when it's black... what would you suggest? ACT tiles to cover the mess up? THINK.
(17) "I don't like the top of the spiral much better; you finally pass the Special Collections which are in a glass-walled Don't Touch city. Again, an actively disinviting transition from finding materials to using them." -Uh.. you forgot to mention the transition through the spectacular reading room (12,000 square feet!!) or the fabulous views from the seattle collection (oh, sorry, those precious books are not replaceable, hence, the glass walls.. you can feel them during the day though, 1-5pm). Your senseless sentences are 'actively disinviting.'
(18) "I hope someone did extensive solar modelling" -Solar modeling, CFD (computer fluid dynamics... used to study smoke paths) modeling, seismic modeling, physical modeling... its all there if you would have only taken the time to research a bit or attend one of the many public meetings.
(19) "I love the Capitol Hill design" -agreed... thank you james cutler.. should be especially nice once the ivy encases it.
(20) "The popup power strips and wireless access at the study tables aren't as good as the stunning blue leather and brass scholar's fitments at the British Library Reading Room, but they are attempts at being as useful" -Yes, attempts at being USEFUL and flexible, as opposed to the ugly fixed blue leather and brass (barf) scholar's fitments at the brit (yawn..boring) library (ref. earlier comment on our aesthetically backwards looking society.. why are we always looking to historical precedent for validation?)
(21) "Not Much Worse Than Everything Else So Far, Though" Not in so far as you forgot that the capacity for human self-deception is unlimited.
(22) "I really, really noticed that books on related subjects aren't usually next to each other in Dewey" Isn't that because the books are organized according to the Dewey Decimal system, as opposed to subject. I thought the Dewey Decimal System is a hierarchical system, in which the arrangement of books on the shelves moves from the general to the specific. what am i missing?
(23) "So the perfect Library is arranged with an infinite number of petals, extensible as their subjects grow, but all opening to the student in the middle: the one corridor collapsed to a point: the one place we want a Panopticon." - I find it interesting that you bring Foucault's panopticon into the mix... wasn't that originally an idea for a PRISON? inmates would fear unverifiable visibility and self behave? a telescopic reach of power? Sounds like a bad idea for a library. Maybe a revisit of Narcissus is in order.
(24) "BLRR catalogue" ..formal...static... not expandable if the collection grows... granny's library... yesterday's library today.
(25) "May this embarrass me a decade from now when it's obvious that the library is the help and pride of the city." Oh, believe me, it won't take 10 years. clewless.
I want to get back to the SPL before answering you, because some things we disagree about seem like totally obvious matters of fact that can be best argued with a camera. I need to spend a lot of time in the UW libraries this month, though, and haven't gotten downtown at all.
However, I just got an invitation to a (librarian-hosted?) tour of the SPL. I'll do that in order to hear the workings described by their best advocates. Possible dates are spread over a month or more, so I might not be back quickly, but it's not like the building's going anywhere in that time.
Suzzallo/Allen are evidence that librarians can adapt even the most awkward buildings to their purpose. Padelford is an actually demented building; and yet the math library in it is tidy and welcoming.