The London Library (Library Design, 1)

Over the course of the past couple of months, I have been expanding my areas of thought in libraries to include library design. On occasion, and with no real schedule, I will share with you some of my favorite library spaces and perhaps talk some about why I like them, as well as why, as a librarian, I feel that they are effective.

Our topic for today is the London Library, one of my favorite libraries worldwide. As a matter of fact, when Jen and I were overseas, we tried to visit, but they were closed. Alas. The London Library is part of a small group of libraries that many Americans see as odd - a membership library - meaning one must pay an annual membership fee (£395) to use (and check out) the library’s collection. The collection itself has more than one million items, with items dating from the 16th century to the present day.

However, let’s talk about what I think is the greatest strength of the London Library - its design. This morning, I saw this image of the new reading room at the London Library, and I knew I wanted to share it with you all:



This is the new Lightwell Reading Room, which opened today. I love the incorporation of the older architectural elements of the building, as well as the use of modern, sleek materials. Beautifully done. More important for the patron, though, is the wonderful natural and artificial light available, as well as the handy reference works on the shelves. I think (unless you already know the London Library) that you will be surprised by the other rooms:





As you can tell, the main reading room is very traditional English, but seems to be well-designed with the patron’s needs in mind - good lighting, comfortable work and seating areas, as well as important reference works close at hand. I don’t see a librarian nearby, though - leading me to ask if it is convenient for the reader to consult their librarian. However, it is a wonderful space, and it is indeed one of my favorite library spaces in the world.

Since you have now seen the reading room, let’s look at the stacks, just for fun:





And let’s conclude with a few shots of the exterior:



What are some of your favorite library spaces? Would you like to see it featured here? Why do you like that space so much? Please let me hear from you in the comments!

Sources:
Images:
http://www.londonlibrary.co.uk/press/General%20library%20images.htm (all images ©2005, The London Library. Fair use rationale: not for profit.)

Text:
London Library. (2010, January 25). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 14:51, February 15, 2010, from http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=London_Library&oldid=339954254

12.5 Inches!

Friends,

As you probably know by now, on Thursday Fort Worth received an all time record of 12.5 inches of snow. Now, to you readers that live in places that regularly “get” snow, that doesn’t sound like much, but really all of Texas is ill-prepared for snow over about an inch. I will say it was absolutely gorgeous and much fun for us, but had some negative consequences, which I will share after this photo of the Water Gardens I took from our hotel room:










































First, as I feel sure you have deduced, we had to spend two nights away from home. Our power was out for about 40 hours, and left our home useless. Cosby was glad to be inside, and we checked on him regularly. The first night the roads were terrible, so our only option was to stay in a nearby hotel, which was nice, but was totally unexpected. We did have a nice meal, though, and turned it into a kind of pre-Valentines celebration. The next day, the roads were much better, but it was super snowy still, and our power was still out - so we spent the entire day at the two Barnes and Noble’s bookstores here in town. (The Fort Worth Public Library was closed) We checked on Cosby a couple of times, and then had to go stay the night at our uncle Doug’s house (Thanks Doug). Our kind neighbors, Amber and John also were without power, and checked on Cosby as well as gave up power updates, and got us out of the snow the first night (thanks guys, and Joe!)

Anyhow, the power is back on and all is back to semi-normal. Just thought you might like an update!

Jason

Aperture 3

Friends, I have not fallen into some abyss, nor has any malady befallen me. I was simply trying to use the trial version of Aperture 3, released earlier this week. Well, to make a long story short - the program is a computer vampire, and only now can I really use my computer. So, my purchasing advice for Aperture 3 is: don’t buy it.

Jason

ALA Annual Conference and Exhibition

Hello - I just would like to let you know that Jen and I will be attending the ALA annual conference in June - if you are going, we look forward to seeing you there! We are certainly excited to attend!

Internet 2009 In Numbers

I saw this referenced earlier this week, and I thought this article was very interesting - a look at the numbers of “the internet” in 2009. Here is a good excerpt of the information:

Social media
• 126 million – The number of blogs on the Internet (as tracked by BlogPulse).
• 84% – Percent of social network sites with more women than men.
• 27.3 million – Number of tweets on Twitter per day (November, 2009)
• 57% – Percentage of Twitter’s user base located in the United States.
• 4.25 million – People following @aplusk (Ashton Kutcher, Twitter’s most followed user).
• 350 million – People on Facebook.
• 50% – Percentage of Facebook users that log in every day.
• 500,000 – The number of active Facebook applications.

And here’s a link to the whole article -

Internet 2009 in Numbers, by Royal Pingdom

Have a great weekend!

A Bit of What I Do at the Carter

Every month, the Amon Carter Museum Library publishes its report of “new” books processed over the last month. I put new in quotes as the books might not be new, but are simply items in the collection that have been fully cataloged over the last month. These books sit in the reading room for the month, allowing patrons to come in and look at them in one convenient place before going into the stacks with the rest of the collection.

I want to write about this today, as out of 62 books this month in the report, I am in some way responsible for 22 of those items. These 22 items were copy-cataloged by me, meaning that someone else had created the original bibliographic record, and I edited it so that it conformed to the cataloging guidelines of the Carter. This might be anything from the simple task of changing the classification (call number) to a more complex task like adding a complete table of contents, adding authority-controlled subject headings (we primarily use Library of Congress Authorities and the Getty’s Art and Architecture Thesaurus), or adding an alternate title.

One of the more interesting things I cataloged was the first item on the list, that appears as:

Moll, Herman, d. 1732.
A new & correct map of the whole world : shewing ye situation of its principal parts. Viz the oceans, kingdoms, rivers, capes, ports, mountains, woods, trade-winds, monsoons, variation of ye compass, climats, &c. With the most remarkable tracks of the bold attempts which have been made to find out the North East & North West Passages / by Herman Moll, geographer, 1719. London : [J. Bowles, 1709-1720]

This map is a wonderful hand-colored map of the world from 1719 (I’ll just say that Baja California was apparently its own continent) and was very interesting to look at. The title you see above is one of two titles that appear on the map. These two titles did not appear in the bibliographic (catalog) record, and so I had to add the second title, as well as some subject headings. It was interesting to see and handle this rare map (Princeton is the only other institution with a copy of it) as well as to contribute to the bibliographic data about it. Maps, as you might have deduced from the unusual call number, are stored in the map file cases in the archives and so are not displayed with the new books on the cart in the reading room.

Please stop by and ask to see this great map! While you are in, another really great map to see is this one:

Map of the states of California and Nevada : carefully compiled from the latest authentic sources / California by Julius H. von Schmidt, Arthur W. Keddie, and C.D. Gibbes, C.E.'s ; Nevada by Chas. Drayton Gibbes, C.E. San Francisco, Calif. : Warren Holt, 1869, c1868 (Philadelphia : S.B. Linton, engr. & lithogr.)

It’s another really great hand-colored historical map of the United States. Drop in and say hello and ask to see these great maps, as well as any other of the fascinating resources at the Amon Carter Museum Library.

Link: Dear Steve Jobs, iBooks has me Nervous

Dr. Dave Lankes has posted his thoughts about the new iPad application, iBooks. I am a bit surprised by the lack of writing about this happening in the library blog community. However, Dr. Lankes has some great points, and to whet your appetite, here is a quote from his original post, as well as a link taking you there:

What makes me nervous about iBooks, the new eBook app from Apple targeted for their iPad, is not what you might expect. DRM, cost models doesn’t worry me. These are mostly imposed by the publishers, and we saw how this played out in music and MP3’s. It is certainly not that eReaders or the move away from physical books in some way endangers the future of the library. Libraries are about knowledge and facilitation, not artifacts and stuff.
No, what worries me about iBooks is that it is so damn boring. I actually found myself angry and disappointed after the big iPad announcement. I expected so much more. I was a little apprehensive about posting these thoughts because I haven’t actually seen the iBooks software. So for all I know, everything I am about to say is there, but there just wasn’t enough time to talk about them. So if that is the case, Apple, my bad. If not, what were you thinking?!
Link: Dear Steve Jobs, iBooks has me Nervous, by Dr. Dave Lankes.