SEATTLE CENTRAL LIBRARY

The first official building to house Seattle's public library was built in 1891 on Pioneer Square, eventually moving to a block bounded by Fourth and Fifth Avenues and Madison and Spring Streets. In 1998, Seattle voters embraced a $196.4m makeover of the library, dubbed 'Libraries for All'.

The initiative includes plans to double the square footage in Seattle's 22 libraries, including the building of new branches – but the icing on the cake is the new $169.2m Central Library at 1,000 Fourth Avenue, designed by Rem Koolhaas' Netherlands-headquartered Office of Metropolitan Architecture (OMA) in joint venture with local LMN Architects.

Partnering Koolhaas on the OMA team was another well-known name, Joshua Prince-Ramus, now of REX Architects in New York. 37 library staff groups and 11 public work groups were involved as well, according to a library statement.

SEATTLE CENTRAL LIBRARY FEATURES

OMA / LMN's creation opened in 2004 after 2.5 years of construction as an 11-floor, 412,000ft² library.

It includes such innovative features as a 'book spiral' on levels 6-9 that displays the entire non-fiction collection in a continuous run, and a 50ft-high living room alongside Fifth Avenue, all housed in a distinctive diamond-shaped glass and steel skin.

4,644t of conventional steel columns not only carry the weight of the building but support lateral loads such as wind and earthquake movement and the weight of the exterior building skin or curtain wall. The diamond-grid 'smart glass' was made by Okalux and custom-made by Germany's Seele.

Five platform areas allow form to follow function, each corresponding with different aspects of the million-book Central Library programme. The interior has been described as awash with natural light and space, inspiring users to read and borrow actual books in today's world of online texts and multimedia presentations.

The 'Mixing Chamber' on level 5 hosts a customer help centre, including 132 of the building's 400 public computers.

The 'Living Room' on level 3 features a teen centre, family fiction collection, shop, coffee bar, auditorium, the Library Equal Access Project and spaces to read or study. 'Living Room' flooring uses a recycled product called Worthwood made by Oregon Lumber.

A 'Seattle Room' on level 10 houses Seattle history and genealogical services. This level also houses the reading room, which has panoramic city views. Level 9 hosts a map room and writers' room. A children's centre on level 1 has special reading rooms.

A cross section of the new Central Library shows the 'mixing chamber'
customer help area and several purpose-built reading rooms.

HIGH-RISE MODIFICATION

"By modifying the superposition of floors in the typical American high-rise, a building emerges that is at the same time sensitive (the slopes will admit unusual quantities of daylight where desirable), contextual (each side can react differently to specific urban conditions) and iconic. Its angular facets form a plausible bracketing of Seattle's new modernity," OMA wrote.

Black wall tiles were made from a porous bead foam sound silencer called EPP-ARPRP sold by Acoustical Surfaces. Carpets were designed by Petra Blaise of Inside / Outside in Amsterdam, using Ege carpet of recyclable nylon or polyamid, from the UK. Level 10's 'pillow' ceiling is acoustic panels wrapped with ripstop nylon.

There are 731 seats at study tables without computers and 190 lounge seats, not counting seats for meeting rooms, out of a total $6.4m furniture budget. It includes a 275-seat auditorium and parking for 143 vehicles. The Central Library now sees two million physical patrons a year.

According to a statement from OMA, the library seems threatened, a fortification ready to be taken by potential enemies. "New libraries don't reinvent or even modernise the traditional institution; they merely package it in a new way," the architects wrote.

OMA's vision was to redefine the library as no longer exclusively dedicated to books but as more of an information store, where all media can be presented. "In an age where information can be accessed anywhere, it is the simultaneity of all media and the professionalism of their presentation and interaction that will make the library new," OMA wrote.

LIBRARY AWARDS

Seattle's new Central Library has won various awards, including the American Institute of Architects 2005 Honor Award, the American Council of Engineering Companies' 2005 Platinum Award for Innovation and Engineering and achieved a silver rating from the US Green Building Council.

Green Design and Earth-Friendly Architecture

Green Design is a term used to describe economical, energy-saving, environmental friendly, sustainable development. These resources explore the relationship between architecture and ecology, and show how you can use concepts of green design in your own home.

Green building-
Green building is the practice of increasing the efficiency with which buildings use resources — energy, water, and materials — while reducing building impacts on human health and the environment, through better sitting, design, construction, operation, maintenance, and removal — the complete building life cycle.

A similar concept is natural building, which is usually on a smaller scale and tends to focus on the use of natural materials that are available locally. Other commonly used terms include sustainable design and green architecture.

Green building materials-
Building materials typically considered to be 'green' include rapidly renewable plant materials like bamboo and straw, lumber from forests certified to be sustainably managed, dimension stone, recycled stone, recycled metal, and other products that are non-toxic, reusable, renewable, and/or recyclable (e.g. Trass, Linoleum, sheep wool, panels made from paper flakes, baked earth, rammed earth, clay, vermiculite, flax linen, sisal, seagrass, cork, expanded clay grains, coconut, wood fiber plates, calcium sand stone. Building materials should be extracted and manufactured locally to the building site to minimize the energy embedded in their transportation.

Cloud Gate in Millennium Park, Chicago

Cloud Gate is a public sculpture by Anish Kapoor in Millennium Park, Chicago. The sculpture is shaped like an ellipse, and its legume-like appearance has caused it to be nicknamed “The Bean”. It is made of 168 highly polished stainless steel plates, and stands at 33 feet high, 66 feet long, and 42 feet wide, weighing 110 tons. From a distance it could be mistaken for a huge drop of mercury, while up close its highly reflective surface captures and transforms the skyline, the downtown cityscape and even the passers-by into a wonderfully warped new vista.

The artist, Anish Kapoor, has referred to the sculpture as “a gate to Chicago, a poetic idea about the city it reflects.” The 12-foot underbelly is called the "omphalos" or navel and multiplies reflections in a vortex.