My Dream Library: “Library as Working Room”

As a young idealist I often thought that when I “grew up” that I would create a library full of objects, and not just books. I imagined turning a museum from a place where we look at objects into a library where you can check objects out and use them and learn more about them. I envisioned abandoned train stations in the Bay Area would be perfect for this dream, but I always seemed to lack the cash and the grants and the ability to pull this off. Of course, in both Berkeley, Ca. and Portland, Or. I utilized the tool lending libraries there, which I thought were amazing. What about libraries being a place to get different kinds of work done?

As a music nerd, this library I learned about today from Aaron Schmidt’s blog Walking Paper is pretty much my dream library except that it is real: http://www.walkingpaper.org/2790 I love the idea of a cultural hub having a library full of ways to create and innovate with music, sound, and video. Are there other fields that we could make this work for? I love the business hub mentioned in here too. Schmidt writes, Their next project is the Urban Office Workspace for people in the city that need a temporary place to conduct business. Two successful business have already been started at Meetingpoint.”

70% of the library is devoted to space for people and 30% is devoted to space for materials. There are very few books, in fact, you can check out a guitar – and why not? 

What I’d love to do is have a total gadget check out library where students could check out iPads and iPods and mp3 players and cell phones to use for class work, etc. And why not?