Ādisōke [Ottawa's New Central Library] | U/C

[Arcologist]

You can sign up for project updates at Inspire555.ca. Same website allows you to register for the upcoming workshops, and soon, to provide input online.

Current workshop is on Spaces and Relationships, taking place on:

May 1, 6:30-8:30 at Jim Durrell on Walkley Rd.

May 4, 9:30a - 11:30a at LAC on Wellington.

[J.OT13]

Some preliminary designs will be unveiled June 1st and 3rd. Here's a preview courtesy of Watson and Tierney.


https://twitter.com/TimTierney/status/1133080745998737408


https://twitter.com/JimWatsonOttawa/status/1133079628044808195

[J.OT13]

Here's another from Archives Twitter. A little too NAC, particularly the ceiling.


https://twitter.com/LibraryArchives/status/1133371109078913027

[Arcologist]

I hope the public gets to see some slightly more detailed draft plans before the architects/designers began to settle on a plan. This building has to be truly iconic!

[acottawa]

Originally Posted by Arcologist

I hope the public gets to see some slightly more detailed draft plans before the architects/designers began to settle on a plan. This building has to be truly iconic!

I think there is zero chance this building will be truly iconic.

[kwoldtimer]

Can't tell much from such minimal renders, but that reading room looks very small, although they've got the wall of windows right.

[Glenlivet Ave]

You can't tell much about the design of the library based on this preliminary render, I do like the volume of this space.

[rondon]

Why you need a library in a digital century? It does not make any sense.
550 libraries have closed in UK in the past six years, and another 111 are set to shut their doors this year. Only 34 percent of Americans visited a local library last year. Three years earlier 53 percent of Americans. The trend is all there. No more libraries.
In Ontario are more then 380 libraries and they are not busy at all. Two thirds of Canadian have a library card, but people stop going to libraries all together.
And read their books online or reading or listening to ebooks. Save the planet, stop printing.

[Jayday23]

Originally Posted by Glenlivet Ave

You can't tell much about the design of the library based on this preliminary render, I do like the volume of this space.

I'm already disappointed by the scale of this room. We can never have anything nice in this city. Just build a shoppers already with a drive-thru starbucks/shawarma combo next to it and lets get this disappointment over with.

[Multi-modal]

Unfortunate they couldn't combine the two reading rooms. I'd like to know the technical (or political) reasons why the OPL and LAC reading rooms couldn't be one giant central reading room.

[zzptichka]

Originally Posted by rondon

Why you need a library in a digital century? It does not make any sense.
550 libraries have closed in UK in the past six years, and another 111 are set to shut their doors this year. Only 34 percent of Americans visited a local library last year. Three years earlier 53 percent of Americans. The trend is all there. No more libraries.
In Ontario are more then 380 libraries and they are not busy at all. Two thirds of Canadian have a library card, but people stop going to libraries all together.
And read their books online or reading or listening to ebooks. Save the planet, stop printing.

Modern libraries are not just about books. Just like old libraries allow to borrow books, libraries of the future make it easy for people to borrow and try tools they would have been hard pressed to get a hold of in their normal life.
I watched a film about new Oodi Library in Helsinki and it's incredible what they got in addition to standard spaces like coworking places and meeting rooms:
- audio recording studio and rehearsal rooms
- musical instruments
- photo studio
- 3D printers
- woodworking workshop
- printshop
- sewing atelier
- theatre studio with costumes and makeup
- all kind of stuff for electrical and soldering projects
and other things

This is the kind of stuff that inspires young people and helps them find what they want to do in life as well as helps adults enjoy their hobbies.

I don't have high expectations about our library getting close to that right away but eventually we'll get there and having a building is an important place to start.

BTW it cost them 150 Million CAD to build in 2018 (vs 200 Million CAD we are spending) and it's absolutely gorgeous inside and outside.

[rondon]

Originally Posted by zzptichka

Modern libraries are not just about books. Just like old libraries allow to borrow books, libraries of the future make it easy for people to borrow and try tools they would have been hard pressed to get a hold of in their normal life.
I watched a film about new Oodi Library in Helsinki and it's incredible what they got in addition to standard spaces like coworking places and meeting rooms:
- audio recording studio and rehearsal rooms
- musical instruments
- photo studio
- 3D printers
- woodworking workshop
- printshop
- sewing atelier
- theatre studio with costumes and makeup
- all kind of stuff for electrical and soldering projects
and other things

This is the kind of stuff that inspires young people and helps them find what they want to do in life as well as helps adults enjoy their hobbies.

I don't have high expectations about our library getting close to that right away but eventually we'll get there and having a building is an important place to start.

BTW it cost them 150 Million CAD to build in 2018 (vs 200 Million CAD we are spending) and it's absolutely gorgeous inside and outside.

You are describing here a workshop of interests. People have this as facebook groups for example ans get together. Instead of building one big hub workshop, community centers like this, should be build in the new developments and they should not be called libraries. And not only function as after school daycares. It is misleading to call it library, because people do not go there to get a printed book anymore. Also. I am living in Avalon Orleans. And what bothers me a lot. When architects develop new city landmarks, they cluster together shopping experience with residential living, entertainment, parks all mixed together. If you take for example Avalon, you will have the same old approach of parks separated from shopping and community activities. Endless parking lots and boxes mixed with fumes and dangerous driving on 10th lines and Innes. People have no where to sit down, enjoy the weather, walk, relax, eat ice cream, see the trees, fountains and green zones with lawns. Taking a break from shopping even having a pick-nick. It is simply putting, disgusting outdated and nobody is protesting what city is planning. Zoning like this, commercial and residential areas.

[McC]

We all make typos, but posts riddled with errors arguing against libraries are serving up some delicious restaurant-quality irony over here.

<chef’s_kiss.gif>

[kwoldtimer]

Originally Posted by Multi-modal

Unfortunate they couldn't combine the two reading rooms. I'd like to know the technical (or political) reasons why the OPL and LAC reading rooms couldn't be one giant central reading room.

Two very different sorts of spaces, istm. The OPL "reading room" should function as Ottawa's living room - think cafe, performance space, lots of noise. Not suited to the LAC, I wouldn't think.

[Kitchissippi]

Originally Posted by McC

We all make typos, but posts riddled with errors arguing against libraries are serving up some delicious restaurant-quality irony over here.

Can I reveal my ideas for a pubic library?

Oh wait, that was meant for the Claridge Moon thread

[Jayday23]

additional render here :https://twitter.com/GuyBerthiaume2/status/1134822656065359873

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by Jayday23

additional render here :https://twitter.com/GuyBerthiaume2/status/1134822656065359873

[McC]

LAC’s reading room would also need to be a bit more sterile and secure, because the material you’re consulting isn’t supposed to leave, right?

[kwoldtimer]

Originally Posted by zzptichka

Modern libraries are not just about books. Just like old libraries allow to borrow books, libraries of the future make it easy for people to borrow and try tools they would have been hard pressed to get a hold of in their normal life.
I watched a film about new Oodi Library in Helsinki and it's incredible what they got in addition to standard spaces like coworking places and meeting rooms:
- audio recording studio and rehearsal rooms
- musical instruments
- photo studio
- 3D printers
- woodworking workshop
- printshop
- sewing atelier
- theatre studio with costumes and makeup
- all kind of stuff for electrical and soldering projects
and other things

This is the kind of stuff that inspires young people and helps them find what they want to do in life as well as helps adults enjoy their hobbies.

....

Just reading that Kitchener's central library has installed a "sensory garden" (i.e. herbs) and a "rainbow garden" (i.e. colourful veggies) in its courtyard with the hope of increasing "nutritional literacy" among patrons, and harvest it for healthy snacks for summer camps and after school programs. Perhaps something Ottawa could consider.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/kitchener...-85-green-nutritional-literacy-1.5154347

[acottawa]

A lot of this sounds like librarians trying to justify their budget and staff in the face of falling demand for their core services.