Santa Monica Library Emerges in New Cover

Once upon a time, libraries were designed for books, and accommodated people. But looking at the new 104,000-sq.-ft. Santa Monica Main Library, you know times have changed. “This building is designed for people and accommodates a healthy book collection,” says City Librarian Greg Mullen, whose job for the past year has involved overseeing a virtual library, which became a reality Saturday when it opened to enormous fanfare and throngs of elated patrons. Mullen was a key consultant advising the architects of Moore Ruble Yudell in designing a library that is not only a repository for materials but also a place for young and old to read, research, relax and enjoy a meal. Clearly elated with what must be the crowning glory of his career, Mullen served as assistant librarian before taking over the top job in September 2005, which gives him jurisdiction over the main library at its same site on 6th street and Santa Monica Blvd. and three branches. The contents remain more or less the same, over 300,000 books, tapes, DVDs and compact discs, but the shell is radically different, taking up a full city block between 6th and 7th, Arizona and Santa Monica. What was formerly the outside parking area on the north side of the old building has turned into the entry courtyard. Patrons will be able to enter the library from there only to find another courtyard and the Bookmark Caf’ from which they can enter the main lobby. This is an extension of the library box, so users can sit al fresco, read a book and enjoy a coffee surrounded by a garden and the under-the-sea art installation. Located just six blocks from the sea, the library benefits from the ocean breezes, and all who were involved in the creative design, including the architects, landscaper Pamela Burton and public artist Carl Cheng, capitalized on the marine influence. The building’s mass is fragmented by its split levels, in-and-out planes and occasional walls painted in a bold palette of burnt orange, chartreuse and ochre. In the garden, succulents, grasses and natives suggest coral and seaweeds, and Cheng’s “Underwater Canopy” evokes an under-the-sea experience with fish floating by. A strong feature of this library is its association with the outside, allowing patrons inside to see the world go by on Santa Monica and 7th. While activity goes on outside, the building is double-paned so the sounds of buses and cars stay outside. The “business” of the library’perusing, researching, securing and borrowing books’will go on as usual, but Mullen hopes with greater ease. “There are improvements, such as service desks that encourage a more collaborative relationship between the librarian and the customers. Computer ‘card catalogues’ are also conveniently spaced at intervals at the end of the stacks so patrons will not have to walk across an entire room to find them.” There is also a bow towards merchandising in presenting the books. “Sixty-five percent of our visitors are browsing for something to read,” Mullen says. “And the popular materials’new books and magazines’are located in a central location on the first level. And there is also a lot more face-out shelving, which shows off the covers of the books rather than the spines.” The children’s area is equipped with kid-sized furniture, computer tables and even miniature toilets and sinks. There is also a stroller parking lot to accommodate what in the past has been a traffic jam. The young adults’ area features a sea of state-of-the-art computer terminals, adjacent to a seating area, the envy of any couch potato. The blond wood Eames chairs and the white and brushed steel lighting fixtures create a clean, modernist atmosphere. Reading nooks abound, especially on the second level, where the nonfiction stacks, the periodical collection and the Santa Monica history collection are located. One seating area on the southwest corner affords a view straight down Santa Monica Boulevard to the pier. Mullen has high hopes for the electronic self-checkout system, which will eliminate the old cumbersome open-book scanning desk and security gate. Six stations are located in the main lobby of the library, just inside the building. The grand entrance to the library on Santa Monica will invite pedestrians, while the Arizona entrance will be more convenient for those arriving in cars. The elevator to the three-level underground parking structure opens on this side. In the original library, built in 1935, a series of chromatic murals created by Palisadian artist Stanton MacDonald-Wright warped in and around the rooms of the Spanish-style building. But in the mid-1960s, when the library was rebuilt, the murals were removed from the walls, crated and banished to the Smithsonian Institution, until they were called back by Santa Monica officials, this time to be displayed in the new library. While the mural panels retain their customized shapes that fit in and around vaulted windows and doorways, and don’t tuck seamlessly into the new architecture, they add a colorful focal point to the upper-level spaces, and their story retains much of its narrative sequencing. Macdonald-Wright’s panels, originally funded by the Federal Public Works Art Project, illustrate man’s progress in technology and science, as well as achievements in art, religion and literature. While the architects could not remount the entire sequence, the library plans to label the panels and offer educational tours and brochures to explain the murals’ historical context. Jamie Lee Loves Books When Jamie Lee Curtis, a longtime Palisadian, film star and author of six award-winning children’s books, learned that her storytelling presentation on the opening day of the library was to be live on City TV Channel 16, she whispered to the kids in the audience that they greet the public with a shout. “We love books.” Curtis, a natural-born storyteller and self-described rebel, was thrilled to be the inaugural author. “This is the first time any people have been in this room (the Martin Luther King, Jr. auditorium). The first fannies that have brushed these seats. Yours will be the first piece of gum stuck on the bottom of the chairs. You should have your names engraved here. The whole idea of a library is a place for people to gather together.” Curtis, the daughter of Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh, recalled her first experience in a library in a conversation on the phone with the Palisadian-Post. “I went to the Beverly Hills Library to research a school (Hawthorne Elementary) paper. My sense memory is the feeling that you could actually get information through the card catalogue. The Dewey Decimal System seemed like another language, but I was amazed that I could do it. It gave me a real feeling of accomplishment and independence. I was in control. “Using the library became more real when I had my own children. I realized that you could take as many as 40 books at a time, a basket of books every week! When I had a daughter, Annie, it proved to be a weekly adventure. I have used the Ocean Park branch, Santa Monica library and the Palisades library. I’ve navigated them all. Now, when I call my daughter at college, if she’s not in her room, her roommate will often say, ‘She’s in the library studying.'” She expects many visits to the new library with her 9-year-old son Tom. Curtis has completed her seventh book, “Is There Really a Human Race, and Am I in It?” which she considers “potentially the most important I’ll ever write. It’s an examination of what we’re doing today as a group of people, based on how we are in the world right now. This book is an exploration with human compassion of what we are doing. ‘Why are we racing, what are we winning, does all my running keep the world spinning?’ The child in the book asks that question, ‘What are we doing?’ I answer it.”