I've just had a most delightful day attending the opening ceremonies of the new Santa Monica Main Library, and exploring the beautiful new 104,000 square foot, 2-storey library, which now takes up an entire city block on Santa Monica Boulevard between 6th and 7th Street. Designed by the Santa Monica firm of Moore Ruble Yudell, the building is the very model of a modern major library with all the technological bells and whistles you can imagine. But it also has a quiet, understated modern aesthetic that is full of light--plenty of big windows all around the building let in the friendly Santa Monica sunshine. The building is very open, quite literally, with entrances on each side (including a three-storey underground parking garage) and a lovely large courtyard inside that is described by the head librarian, Greg Mullen, as an outdoor reading room. Glass windows throughout the library look out into this space, which welcomes you with a meandering water feature, cafe tables and chairs, and beautiful landscaping. A space, as yet unoccupied, awaits the occupation of the Bookmark Cafe, and hovering over the cafe space, the focal point of the courtyard, is a large steel and glass canopy, by artist Carl Cheng. The canopy holds large blue-green glass panels upon which have been photo printed drawings of kelp. (Cheng pointed out in a brief talk this morning that Santa Monica Bay is host to a huge 100' tall kelp forest.) A Friends of the Library bookshop is also available off the courtyard. The landscape architecture is by Pamela Burton and it, like the whole building, is sustainable, consisting primarily of trees and plants that require little water or maintenance. 35 large Mexican fan palms, part of the landscaping from the previous library, and kept alive at a Valley nursery during the two and one half years of construction, have been replanted on the new site. The water that is needed for the whole building, including the landscaping, is collected (from rainwater!) in large cisterns in the building's basement. The roof has solar panels.

Inside, the stack endpanels, the furniture, and even the stairway railings are the most luscious blonde wood; the carpet is deep blue, with touches of green and purple. Half-hidden (but worth seeking out) and scattered behind the stacks on the second floor are large sections of what was originally a 2,000 square foot mural, painted on canvas in 1934-35 for the second incarnation of the SMPL (the current one is the fourth), by Stanton Macdonald-Wright. When a new library was built in 1965, the mural was given to the Smithsonian Institution. It is still owned by the Smithsonian but has been installed in the new library, on "indefinite loan." The installation was overseen by Ilene Fort, Curator of American Art at the L.A. County Museum of Art. Fort will be giving a presentation on the mural on Saturday, January 28, at 2 pm, in the library's Martin Luther King Jr. Auditorium.

This Monday, January 9, at 7 pm, there will be a presentation in the MLK Auditorium at 7 pm by John Ruble, the principal architect, and architectural historian, Kenneth Breisch. I highly recommend a visit--and leave plenty of time for exploring the library; there's lots to see. You might want to make it a Santa Monica day, since the library is only six blocks from the ocean. It's close to the pier, the Third Street Promenade, and lots of wonderful restaurants on the Promenade, on Ocean Avenue, and on Santa Monica Blvd. as well. See their Web site at www.smpl.org.