WHAT A LIBRARY!!

I guess I may have just visited one of the big mamas of all libraries. Cool! The Seattle Library is truly a wonderful place to go. Ten stories of nothing but books and books and books....hundreds of computers....a coffee/sandwich shop....a gift store devoted to all things "library"...wow! I was impressed. I wanted to move in.

Check out part of their mission statement, "Our mission is to become the best public library in the world by being so tuned in to the people we serve and so supportive of each other's efforts that we are able to provide highly responsive service."

Pretty lofty goal this library has, I'd say.

Below is a bit of information I've taken from their website regarding the building itself, very unusual, bordering on slightly less than beautiful (my opinion, of course). The building is unlike any of the other buildings I've seen in downtown Seattle...a real eye-catcher, for sure.
When Cletus and Maude drive on in off the Montana plains to enjoy some big city life, they are likely to be a bit bumfuzzled by this decidedly unusual building.

Quote from their website follows.
"Twenty-nine major national, international and local firms sought the opportunity to design the new structure. The Library Board's architectural choice for the project was as bold as "Libraries for All" itself. The surprise winner was Rem Koolhaas and his Office for Metropolitan Architecture in Rotterdam, in partnership with the Seattle firm of LMN Architects. The iconoclastic Dutch architect had no major buildings built in America when the Library Board selected him over two other finalists, but the board's choice seemed insightful a year later when Koolhaas was awarded architecture's highest international honor, the Pritzker Prize.

His 11-floor, 362,987-square-foot library, a dazzling avant-garde symphony of glass and form, has many innovative features, including:

A "Books Spiral" that displays the entire non-fiction collection in a continuous run;
A towering "living room" along Fifth Avenue that reaches 50 feet in height;
A distinctive diamond-shaped exterior skin of glass and steel.

So there, that's what I did for part of a day in downtown Seattle. I so enjoyed visiting this library. If I had money, that's who I'd give it to...libraries. I could just lay down my bedroll and bunk down in just about any of them.

Someday I'll tell a story about how several ladies from a library in a small town in Illinois took such good care of me when I was researching an interest I had at the time, that I actually did something for them when I left the town...not much, mind you, but something...another time, though, I must get my beauty sleep now...how I need it : )