Michael and Kaylyn's Adventures

04 September 2004

Our Funky New Library

This is the brand new building for the main branch of the Seattle Public Library. It looks pretty weird from the outside, but it actually works really well as a library building and the library staff and patrons are pretty much universally happy with it.

This is one of two lobbies at the library. (The building sits on a steepish grade, so there's a smaller entrance at the other ground level.) This space has become known as "Seattle's living room". We're just glad we don't have to dust it!

The interior of the library is very colorful. The bold yellow escalators are just the beginning of a bright color scheme continued throughout the library. Colors aren't the only bold thing about this building, however. When you return books at the lower entrance you get to put them right into a serious-looking machine and watch them on their way into the nether regions of the library. The nonfiction stacks are arranged in a Dewey Decimal spiral that spans multiple floors and ends the frustrating "Do I go right or left at this quadrant to find astrology" game many libraries force you to play. The children's section is filled with interestingly-shaped furniture and places the Reading Room in its own cavey hideaway. The floor of the international section seems to have you walking on an old-time printer's worksurface as it's covered in hardwood embellished with raised letters from many different languages. *That* must be fun for the cleaning staff -- not!

This part of the library is popularly known as "The Stomach" for obvious reasons. It contains public meeting rooms, but when we were there the most common reason to be wandering around seemed to be the making of exclamations such as "This place is *very* red" and "This is about the weirdest hallway I've ever seen" and "Oh My Gosh". And no, we don't know what that last thing is supposed to be.