While on business in Seattle this week I visited one of the most daring examples of public architecture of the past decade, the Seattle Central Library.   The building, designed primarily by Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas, has drawn mixed reviews both architecture afficianados and the general public as I found out in a conversation with a Taxi Driver the evening before my visit:

“Is that the Seattle Central Library?” I asked.

“Yeah.   But it’s pretty much become like an enormous Temple to Nerds.” he replied.

“Are there plaques to nerds in there?”

“No, but there are plaques to the companies run by nerds that gave them the money to build that piece of s***.  Microsoft, Amazon, Amgen…”

“Those are some rich nerds.” I added.

“Yeah, but the funny thing is that at this point all there products are f****** s***!”

At this point the conversation devolved into some typical thing about Bill Gates taking his ideas from other companies, yada, yada, yada.   But I digress.

Upon arriving at the door of the Library several minutes before it opened I noticed throngs of the typical library demographics assembled in the plaza next to the building on Seattle’s 4th Avenue: students looking to do a little research, Senior Citizens, lower income residents looking for some free internets and homeless guys - who for some reason in Seattle often seem to have more of a backpacker vibe than elsewhere - looking for a public restroom.

Once the doors opened, I began my investigative journey around the building.   I’ve always found it fun to check out a public space as an observer where virtually everyone else around you is there for a different purpose.   I immediately started looking around the floor on the 4th Avenue side and found what looked like a really fun Children’s Section.   It had a lower ceiling than most other areas in the library, giving it a more intimate feel, and it also featured lots of little tables for the yung’uns to play both computer games and board games and puzzles.

I then took an elevator to the top of the building and began working my way down through what is termed “The Spiral” of books.   It’s not really a spiral to be honest, there are long, stretched out ramps that gently descend across each floor of the “The Spiral” with a set of bookshelves lining each “step” - each “step” stretching horizontally across the entire side of the building.   It’s an interesting arrangement which apparently can be expanded to house almost double the 750,000 non-fiction books currently in the collection of the library.   I took the series of stairways and ramps down to what is known as “The Mixing Chamber” - a phrase the library puts in its elevators and signs as well in referring to the floor.   This is a reference floor which also includes multiple Internet terminals, a “Mix” of information a friendly and helpful library employee told me on the floor.

There were certainly some very interesting features to the library from a design point, but while I don’t pretend to be an architecture critic, I found some of the choices a little uninspired and in some cases downright foolish.   Chief amongst these was that despite the fact that the structure only opened slightly over four years ago in 2004, it already seems very, very dated.   Many of the fixtures, including most notably the bookshelves, tables, floors and carpet panels looked like something out of the Club Kid scene of the 1990’s.   This sort of vibe might work for an H&M store, but for a place trying to convey the gravitas of knowledge and learning, it just seemed severely out of place and kind of silly in a way.   Unfortunately it seemed like Koolhaas had gambled…and lost.

Something the building has won at though is incorporating sustainability into its construction.   This came from the inception of the building on the site with erosion and sedimentation control of the building process.   It’s alos been incorporated into the design with bicycle parking spaces, landscaping and interior design to reduce the “heat island” effect so common of structures in major cities, and lighting controls to reduce light pollution.   The building is also extremely water efficient, featuring no-flush urinals, an efficient drip-irrigation system for its landscaping, and a 38,500 Gallon water collection that provides most of the water for the facility in rainy Seattle rather than taking it from the public water system.

You can takepart in learning more Green construction ideas by checking out GreenBuilding.com.

LINKS:

Wikipedia: Seattle Central Library

Thomas Hawk’s Digital Connection: Seattle’s Central Library

The Seattle Times: Seattle’s new library