In the year 2000, the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) awarded its prestigious Stirling Prize to Peckham Library, by architects Alsop and Stormer. Although it wasn't the first time for a library to win the prize, it was the first time a local library won it. It was an illustration of the times when public finances could conjure briefs with the intention to "create a building of architectural merit that will bring prestige to the borough." The library was commended for the public open space it created, its fun and colorful design, and its environmental credentials. It sits proudly in the heart of the community and it is interesting that its sign, projecting above the roof line, simply spells 'Library', an indication of the importance of this building's function to the area.
Fast forward twenty or so years and the change in landscape is palpable. According to the BBC, one in twenty local libraries in the United Kingdom have closed and a third of those remaining have reduced opening hours. By 2019, almost 800 libraries had closed across the country. It is noted that local libraries are not used by members of the community for only borrowing books, but also for literacy clubs, access to computers, and even as warm spaces during cold winters. With such a deep crisis affecting these vital community facilities, how are designers responding to new needs and constraints? This applies to the UK and internationally, where similar problems are present. How is the gap between community aspirations for libraries and the means available being bridged by design?
Staying within the UK, a project that bucks this trend is the recently completed Plumstead Centre by architects Hawkins\Brown. Located in one of the outer boroughs of Greater London, the old Plumstead Library occupied a historic building purposely built in 1903. It became increasingly underused over the years and had fallen on hard times. A rear section of the building was only used as storage for the mobile library, while the reference library section was replaced with a museum of local history that wasn't as successful as hoped. When the local council decided to renovate and extend the building and develop new activities for it, rather than imposing preconceived ideas, it engaged an architect at the very beginning of the briefing stage. According to Jason Martin, partner at Hawkins\Brown, this meant engaging deeply with the current users and the local community.
Despite the library being underused, it became apparent that local residents had a strong desire to keep it. The trick was to incorporate additional uses that would increase the footfall in the library, and the hope was for the different uses to work symbiotically. A local badminton group practiced in a makeshift court nearby, so this function was incorporated in the form of a small sports hall in the new design. An operator of local fitness facilities proposed the inclusion of a gym. A vaulted ceiling was discovered in the existing historic building and this became a large, daylit play room. There were meeting rooms that could be used for music practice as well as a dance studio with a sprung floor.
In addition to this, a new, bright entrance was created with level access and lifts to improve accessibility. A café created a casual space and meeting point for the various users. With all these different functions, what turned out to be one of the biggest successes was a large unprogrammed space in the middle of the building formed of tiers like an auditorium and connecting the ground floor with the first. This was also used as a meeting spot, a reading area, or a space for doing homework. After the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown was lifted, the first in-person council meeting was held in this space.
All in all, the Plumstead Centre succeeded in creating a thriving community space. The multitude of additional functions did not detract from the purpose of the library but rather revitalized it. This integration of functions within a library building can be seen in a multitude of examples and can be the key to long-term success. Nestled in a wooded area in Latvia, the Ogre Central Library and Marriage Registry is a combination of functions not normally associated with each other. It contains several spaces related to the library, such as a children's library, a reading room, and meeting rooms, as well as a conference hall and a summertime café. The center also contains a civil registry office complete with a ceremony hall.
Like in Plumstead, PBR Architects Bureau engaged extensively with the local community to develop the brief for the library. Spaces like a baby playing area with an adjacent care and feeding room and a rock-climbing wall in the children's games room were added. The marriage registry and ascetic ceremony hall are located on the second floor, with ample glazing facing the canopy of trees. The structure of the whole building is composed of glue-laminated and cross-laminated timber with multiple hipped pitched roofs that delineate the different functions of the library.
Heading south, the Masoro Learning & Sports Centre in Rwanda is another example. It sits in a rural location near the village of Masoro, combining a library, classrooms, technology education rooms, indoor and outdoor exercise spaces, community teaching gardens, outdoor theaters, a basketball court, and a community soccer field. According to the architects, General Architecture Collaborative, changes in the topography were used to differentiate between the various functions and create seating.
Examples from around the world showcase a consistent interest in the varied roles of libraries as highly valued social and cultural assets in local communities, from the simple 'library' sign on Peckham Library to the residents of Plumstead wishing to save their underused library, or the community of Masoro gathering for a local sporting event. Introducing new functions to existing or newly built libraries is becoming a method of guaranteeing their survival. In Brooklyn, New York, home to many historic libraries built in the early to mid-twentieth century, this was recognized by Situ Studio. The architects studied the Borough's 59 public libraries and identified the various ancillary functions desired locally, most of which were not catered for by the historic architecture.
These functions, ranging from fitness classes to exhibitions and play spaces, have very different requirements. These include flooring types, acoustic isolation, daylight versus dark rooms, use of projectors, privacy versus openness, etc. To tackle multiple sites at once, Situ Studio devised a 'kit of parts' that could be installed in different combinations to provide the required environmental conditions for each activity, hence the project's name 'Making Spaces'. The scheme is an architectural response to the diversification of uses that had already begun to take place in many of the borough's libraries and is a further testament to this being a method of survival and revitalization of local libraries.
This article is part of the ArchDaily Topics: Designing for the Common Good. Every month we explore a topic in-depth through articles, interviews, news, and architecture projects. We invite you to learn more about our ArchDaily Topics. And, as always, at ArchDaily we welcome the contributions of our readers; if you want to submit an article or project, contact us.
