Categories Library Spaces

206 posts

Posts highlighting cool or unusual (or not so great) things that people are doing in libraries

Little Free Library Contest – Please Consider Voting

Everyone – just got clarification: Vote for Cassidy’s super cool video about the Little Free Library at Spider Lake by liking or pinning it on this page: http://pinterest.com/ltlfreelibrary/film-festival/ Please forgive the shameless plug but I am knocked out by Cassidy’s work on this video! He taught himself iMovie and engaged with the kids in our little neighborhood as actors! Please share the link above with friends and if they like the video, maybe they’ll vote too.

Our Little Free Library has a Video! It’s a LFL Film Fest Entry

Summer Time Reading at The Little Free Library HOW COOL! A teen who lives next to us at the lake made a video for the Little Free Library Film Festival! Cassidy shot the video on his iPod Touch and used some of our pics from the building of the library. The video features the kids and neighbors who use our Little Free Library (and a shot at the campfire too!) I am really knocked out by his creativity! The video has been entered into the  LFL Film Festival contest. http://www.littlefreelibrary.org/little-free-library-film-festival.html If you pin it or Like it on YouTube – […]

Designing Libraries That Encourage Teens to Loiter (by TTW Contributor Justin Hoenke)

 Instead of siphoning teens off into different rooms (and locking away noisy activities), the space is airy and completely open. The openness means, among other things, that it only takes one or two librarians to monitor the entire space. Rice says his team renovated the floor on the cheap, using paint and low-cost materials to fill the space. “Teens appreciate the rawness,” he says. “Rich materials might be a little bit of a turn-off.” The key, he says, is a space without much security, where kids feel free to just hang out. “It makes teens feel as if they have […]

Maker Space Disruption – New PW Piece by Brian Kenney

Brian Kenney’s new piece in Publishers Weekly is on Maker Spaces: http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/industry-news/libraries/article/56603-meet-your-makers.html I love his take: What’s radical about maker spaces in libraries? Pretty much everything. Maker spaces are messy in a library world that values order, disruptive in a culture run by schedules, chaotic in a profession that did, after all, develop the Dewey Decimal System. Hill, who has an empty floor she is using for her maker space, says it’s up to the community to determine how they use it. The library is there to provide support, but she has no idea what direction it will take. Maker […]

Little Free Library coming to Monessen, PA (by TTW contributor Justin Hoenke)

(from TribLive, Pittsburgh, PA: http://goo.gl/Tu7GM) Monessen residents soon will be able to borrow library books – at the laundromat. Jill Godlewski, children’s director at the Monessen Public Library, is planning to place several portable libraries scattered around town. Godlewski hopes to situate the wooden dispensaries once the weather clears. “The idea is to get books to people instead of people having to come to the library to get books,” Godlewski said. “We want to make sure there are no barriers to getting a book. My favorite part? A partnership with the local school! Monessen school district Superintendent Linda Marcolini is […]

Self Service Library in Montreal

Lora Baiocco writes: I took this picture on the way to work and I thought you might be interested in a little free library initiative taking place in Montreal. I don’t have anything to do with the project but I think it’s very cool! It’s called Livre Service which translates to “Book Service” – but it’s also a play on “Libre Service” which means “self-service” – fun!

Makerspace Lawsuits – A TTW Guest Post by Rick Thomchick

Monica Harris, a librarian from Oak Park, Illinois, recently posted a great article to the MakerSpaces and the Participatory Library group on Facebook about 3D printing and intellectual property in which Chris Anderson declared, “we’re going to get sued.” I wryly replied with a link to a Wired article that the lawsuits had already begun. Michael Weinberg, an attorney with Public Knowledge who was interviewed for the article, characterized 3D printers as a “disruptive technology” that is raising many intellectual property issues, and Monica pointed out that 3D printers have exposed the differences between copyright and patent law. Physical objects such as figurines, models, or Lego […]

The Portal at Tippecanoe County PL

Note from Michael: I met Tippecanoe County PL (Lafayette, IN) director Jos Holman at IPLA last week. He told me about his library’s creation space “The Portal.” S. Neal Starkey, Head Technology Librarian, followed up with some info and a link. I thought this was a good example of what’s possible in a medium-sized midwest library. The Portal is a new public space the Tippecanoe County (Indiana) Public Library system custom-designed to give its customers a place to learn, create, and interact with new technologies. This space is currently populated with a mix of desktops, laptops, and tablets. The design and seating are flexible […]

Office Hours: Little Free Libraries

My new column is up: http://lj.libraryjournal.com/2012/09/opinion/michael-stephens/little-free-libraries-office-hours Scanning the recent news articles about the LFL movement reveals something else, too. More often than not, those interviewed acknowledge the sense of community and collegiality that grow up around the little libraries. From a Los Angeles Times piece on a local LFL: “It has turned strangers into friends and a sometimes impersonal neighborhood into a community. It has become a mini–town square….” This gets to the heart of what many of us in libraries know: knowledge shared within a framework of caring and familiarity can strengthen communities. Evidence of caring is present in the knowledge […]