British architecture practice Heatherwick Studio is going to design its first public library. This building aims to become a community centre in the heart of Columbia, a city that belongs to the state of Maryland in the USA. This library will house different services, such as educational, work and cultural spaces.

Library's role will serve as a legacy for Columbia, known as one of the best places to live in America, fostering diversity and promoting the well-being of the city. The project will be designed in collaboration with the Howard Hughes Company and the Howard County Library team.

With this design, Heatherwick Studio tries to change the role that libraries play in people's lives, adding different functions such as hosting events, promoting learning and lending useful objects to acquire knowledge, art or tools.

"(...) A walkable, planted building that emerges from the lakeside landscape will house an amphitheatre for events, play areas and light filled rooms designed for working and learning anything from cooking to IT. This will be the community centre everyone in Howard County deserves.

Heatherwick Studio partner and group leader Stuart Wood.

Library is located on the main promenade of the city, overlooking Lake Kittamaqundi. It will be made up of five floors, with work and play areas, a laboratory and even kitchens. Construction of the project is expected to start late 2024 and be completed in 2027.



Rendering. Columbia Community Library by Heatherwick Studio.

Description of project by Heatherwick Studio

-The project is the studio’s first public library.
-The building will become a community centre at the heart of Columbia, Maryland.
-Behind a climbable façade, the library will be home to a range of services from education spaces to cultural programmes and workspaces.

Heatherwick Studio has unveiled their first public library design. Conceived for Howard County Libraries in Maryland, USA, the building will reflect the changed role of the library and serve a community with a rich heritage of fostering diversity and promoting wellbeing in the city.

The new library will sit at the heart of Columbia, a planned community consistently voted as one of the best places to live in the USA. Working with Howard Hughes Company and the Howard County Library team, the studio has designed the building to reflect the changed role libraries play in our lives. Going beyond a simple repository of knowledge and book lending services, the new space will act as a centre for the community and will become Columbia’s hub for events, learning, and lending of objects of use such as art or tools.


Rendering. Columbia Community Library by Heatherwick Studio.

Stuart Wood, partner and Group Leader at the studio said:

Columbia has always been driven by a socially radical vision. This legacy inspired us to evolve the traditional library beyond books and into a new type of community centre for broader learning and social exchange. A walkable, planted building that emerges from the lakeside landscape will house an amphitheatre for events, play areas and light filled rooms designed for working and learning anything from cooking to IT. This will be the community centre everyone in Howard County deserves.

Inspired by the vision of James Rouse, the founder of the community who saw ‘cities as gardens for the growing of people’ the building will become the truly knit to the neighbourhood both through its facilities and its location. Set on the city’s main promenade, and with panoramic views of Lake Kittamaqundi, the library is designed to host education and cultural programmes. Its five storeys will accommodate working spaces and play areas as well as a makers’ lab, teaching kitchen and a café.
 
The building itself appears as if lifting from the surrounding landscape with cascading planted staircases weaving across the façade to reveal the open, double-storey atrium where the county plans to host a programme of public events. Honouring the Rousian vision of respect for nature for the enjoyment and recreation of the city’s residents the building’s many terraces will be richly planted in native plant species. The façade will seamlessly join with the surrounding public park and lakefront thus becoming an integral part the community’s natural gathering and relaxation place.

The library will serve all county residents and as well as visitors from across the US. Construction is expected to start in late 2024 with the library opening to the public in 2027.

More information

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Late 2024-2027.
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Columbia, Maryland. USA.
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Thomas Heatherwick (17.02.1970) established in 1994, Heatherwick Studio recognised for its work in architecture, urban infrastructure, sculpture, design and strategic thinking. Today a team of 180, including architects, designers and makers, works from a combined studio and workshop in Kings Cross, London.

At the heart of the studio’s work is a profound commitment to finding innovative design solutions, with a dedication to artistic thinking and the latent potential of materials and craftsmanship. This is achieved through a working methodology of collaborative rational inquiry, undertaken in a spirit of curiosity and experimentation.

In the twenty years of its existence, Heatherwick Studio has worked in many countries, with a wide range of commissioners and in a variety of regulatory environments. Through this experience, the studio has acquired a high level of expertise in the design and realisation of unusual projects, with a particular focus on the large scale.

The studio’s work includes a number of nationally significant projects for the UK, including the award-winning UK Pavilion at the Shanghai World Expo 2010, the Olympic Cauldron for the London 2012 Olympic Games, and the New Bus for London.

Thomas is an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects; a Senior Research Fellow at the Victoria & Albert Museum; and has been awarded Honorary Doctorates from the Royal College of Art, University of Dundee, University of Brighton, Sheffield Hallam University and University of Manchester.

He has won the Prince Philip Designers Prize, and, in 2004, was the youngest practitioner to be appointed a Royal Designer for Industry. In 2010, Thomas was awarded the RIBA’s Lubetkin Prize and the London Design Medal in recognition of his outstanding contribution to design.

In 2013 Thomas was awarded a CBE for his services to the design industry.

 

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Published on: April 4, 2023
Cite: "Heatherwick Studio designs a new community library for Columbia" METALOCUS. Accessed
<http://www.metalocus.es/en/news/heatherwick-studio-designs-a-new-community-library-columbia> ISSN 1139-6415
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