New Library Buildings Part VI: Sciences Library, Brown University BY JOSEPHINE R. CARSON,* Biomedical Librarian JAMES E. BOBICK,t Biomedical Reference Librarian Reference and Information Services Department Sciences Library, Brown University Providence, Rhode Island Physical Sciences Library. Geology was added in 1940. From 1938 until December 1964 this diviBrown was one of the first universities in the nation to sional library was housed on the third and fourth combine its science collections into a single library in the interest of aiding interdisciplinary teaching and re- floors of the Metcalf Research Laboratory of the search. This paper discusses the evolution of the Chemistry Department. Sciences Library and its resources, the development of When the Rockefeller Library was completed the medical education program, and the physical aspects in 1964, the collections in the humanities and the of the new library building. A fifteen-story tower, housing the collections of the physical, biological, and social sciences were transferred from the John medical sciences, symbolizes the interdisciplinary ap- Hay Library. From December 1964 until proach to teaching and research at Brown University. December 1971, the Physical Sciences Library and the Special Collections were joint tenants of the John Hay Library. TWO decisions, the first made in the late thirties Until the Physical Sciences Library was moved and the second in the late fifties, form the back- into the John Hay Library in December 1964, part ground to the Sciences Library. Within the pres- of its collection was in storage. This move became ent fifteen-story tower, called simply the Sciences mandatory when construction joining the Metcalf Library, the collections of two divisional libraries Research Laboratory and the Metcalf Laboratory were integrated, bringing together the Physical (Teaching) made access to the Physical Sciences Sciences Library, formed in 1938, and the Bio- Library impossible and physically dangerous. logical Sciences Library, formed in 1939. BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES LIBRARY The concept of divisional libraries came to fruiIn 1939 the Natural Sciences Library was fortion in the late thirties when it became evident that the needs of teaching and research could not mally established as the second of the two divibe adequately satisfied by the narrow confines and sional libraries of Brown University Library, restrictions of the departmental libraries. Not combining the departmental libraries of biology, only was access to materials restricted but costs botany, psychology, and geology. The Natural were high because of duplication of materials and Sciences Library was also first housed in the personnel. From a study that was made by Dr. Metcalf Research Laboratory. In 1940 the collections of biology, botany, and Henry Van Hoesen emerged the plan for two divisional libraries, one to house physical sciences ma- psychology were moved to the Arnold Biological terials and one to house biological sciences ma- Laboratory, where a lecture hall was converted to library space. The name of the library was terials. changed from the Natural Sciences Library to the PHYSICAL SCIENCES LIBRARY Biological Sciences Library. In the Arnold BioIn 1938 the departmental libraries of mathe- logical Laboratory, the library consisted of one matics, astronomy, physics, chemistry, and floor 50 feet by 50 feet and a mezzanine 20 feet by engineering were brought together to form the 50 feet. In 1962/63 a basement floor was added to the library. Within the next few years, almost half *Josephine R. Carson is now a part-time lecturer at the collection was stored at the Rockefeller Lithe University of Rhode Island Graduate Library brary. School, Kingston, Rhode Island. In 1940 the Biological Sciences Library had a tJames E. Bobick is now Coordinator of Science Liof 8,500 books and 8,800 bound periocollection braries, Temple University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. 179 Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 64(2) April 1976 ABSTRACT
CARSON AND BOBICK
dicals. By July 1971 the collection had grown to 85,000 books and bound periodicals. The first spurt in growth in the biological sciences came after World War II. In the fifties, and especially after Sputnik, the growth in the biological sciences assumed a geometric progression, an experience that was similar throughout the country. Increased undergraduate and graduate enrollment, additional faculty and research projects all had their impact on demands for library materials and services.
neighboring Pawtucket. (Affiliated hospitals now number eight.) In order to permit elective clinical experience for medical students and continuing medical education programs for practicing physicians, the program has recently entered into associations with eight additional institutions. LIBRARY COOPERATION
Cooperative efforts with hospital and health sciences libraries were not a new concept and had been an on-going activity since 1952. Long before MEDICAL EDUCATION PROGRAM phrases such as consortium, out-reach, and By 1959/60 planning began for the addition of cooperative sharing had come into vogue, hospital medical education, to consist of the first two years and health sciences librarians from Rhode Island of medical school. To the already strong basic and nearby Massachusetts had been meeting incollection of some 800 journals were added ap- formally six to eight times a year for the purposes proximately 800 medical journals. Gifts from the of acquainting themselves with existing collections U.S. Surgeon General's Office, the College of and personnel and for providing assistance when Physicians and Surgeons of Philadelphia, local needed. The first evidence of the cooperative nahospital libraries, and the scientific community ture of this group was a Union List of Medical formed the retrospective holdings for new serial Journals, published in 1953. Since then, six other editions have been published; the seventh edition subscriptions. The medical education program which began in was published in April 1975. In addition to the union list, duplicates are 1963 was designed as a six-year program. A graduate from this program obtained an M.M.S. offered first to all hospital and health sciences lidegree and could then transfer to a four-year braries in the state, and then to a wider audience. medical school for the clinical years, end his Assistance, both formal and informal, has been formal education with this degree, or enroll in a given to new librarians. In all of these ventures, Ph.D. program. the Biological Sciences Library assumed a de Another highlight of the sixties was the facto leadership role. The basic philosophy for emergence of the Division of Biological and operation was that in order for the group to be Medical Sciences on July 1, 1965. This was the strong, each member should become as strong as result of the merger of the Departments of possible; true cooperation is based upon the Biology and Botany with the emerging program in maximum strength each unit can provide. medical education. When the Countway Library of Medicine, the Administrative reorganizations in April 1968 regional medical library for region I, chose the and January 1973 clearly defined the responsi- area resource libraries to back up the smaller bilities of the Division of Biological and Medical units, the Biological Sciences Library was asked Sciences to undergraduate concentration pro- to be the area resource library for Rhode Island. grams in biology and medical sciences, and a In essence, this formalized an on-going cooperamedical education program which included under- tion which had been in existence since 1952. graduate, professional, and post-doctoral proMEDICAL DEGREE PROGRAM grams. The medical education program is now a sevenAFFILIATION AND COOPERATION year program, taking high school graduates On February 3, 1969, Brown University, a through to the M.D. degree. This is an extension Rhode Island educational corporation, signed a of the six-year M.M.S. program which operated statement of affiliation with five hospitals: Rhode between 1963 and 1973. The first five years are Island Hospital, Roger Williams General Hos- basically the same as in the M.M.S. program, pital, The Miriam Hospital, The Providence Ly- followed by a fifty-six-week period of hospital ing-In Hospital (now called Women and Infants clerkship, plus a seventh year of elective Hospital of Rhode Island), all located in Provi- experiences: university courses, research, or tudence, and Pawtucket Memorial Hospital, in torials with practicing physicians in a hospital or
180
Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 64(2) April 1976
SCIENCES LIBRARY, BROWN UNIVERSITY
ambulatory care setting. The first M.D. degrees were awarded in June 1973. THE SCIENCES LIBRARY By 1959 the Biological Sciences Library was already an overcrowded facility, even though the gifts of older volumes of medical periodicals were in storage. The allotment of the basement floor alleviated the situation for a few years. However, it was soon evident that all periodicals prior to 1930, and then prior to 1950 and eventually 1960 and 1965, would have to be stored at the opposite end of the campus, with paging done on a daily basis. Throughout the fifties various possible locations for a new Biological Sciences Library were investigated and then discarded.
.-
is--
By 1959 the nature of interdisciplinary teaching and research at Brown University pointed strongly and definitely to the need for a sciences library which would bring together library materials in all scientific disciplines. A proposal for a grant to support the construction of a sciences library was submitted to the National Science Foundation on November 27, 1959. Planning for the new library began in 1960. On July 24, 1967, an application for a joint construction grant was received by the Department of Health, Education and Welfare, for that portion of the library which was to constitute the Medical Sciences Library. The decision to include the Medical Sciences Library as a unit of the Sciences Library is a reflection of the basic
_
FIG. I.-Exterior of Sciences Library. Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 64(2) April 1976
181
CARSON AND BOBICK
philosophy of the medical science program at Brown, namely, that the medical education curriculum should be embedded in the general university curriculum. It is therefore argued that there are positive advantages in having the medical library functioning within the library of sciences to maximize access to the research collections in the basic sciences which serve as a foundation for the medical sciences and clinical medicine. Ground for the construction of the Sciences Library was broken in May 1969. The library was opened in December 1971 and represented the consolidation and merger, under one roof, of all the library holdings of the two divisional sciences libraries. THE BUILDING Danforth Toan of Warner, Burns, Toan, and Lunde designed the Sciences Library to be a spatial pivot point and intellectual symbol for the university's science complex. Standing like a giant bookstack among surrounding science department buildings, the library looks exactly like what it is: a repository of research materials. Eleven of the building's fifteen floors are devoted to stacks, with the north and south facades resembling book-
shelves with their exposed concrete floor beams and solar bronze glass (Fig. 1). In a purely architectural sense, the building expresses its truth at a glance: four massive concrete towers at the corners visibly delineate the structure of the building, and their load-bearing role is emphasized by vertical ribbing of buffcolored concrete; smoother concrete is used between the towers and for beams. The towers, which enclose elevators and stairs, are set out from the building in order to render the interior spaces entirely free of columns and thus achieve maximum efficiency in use. To preserve the impact of the tower rising straight from the ground, the architects put the largest, and busiest, space underground. The lower level covers five times the area of the tower. Sunken courts at the four corners of the building provide daylight and landscaped views to the underground interiors. Warner, Burns, Toan, and Lunde also designed Brown University's John D. Rockefeller, Jr. Library which was dedicated in 1964. That library houses the social sciences and humanities collections; the interiors emphasize woods, fabrics, and leather. By comparison, the tone of the Sciences Library is brisker and more utilitarian. Its interiors contrive a "scientific look" with exposed
FIG. 2.-Lobby area.
182
Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 64(2) April 1976
SCIENCES LIBRARY, BROWN UNIVERSITY
X.1flT
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-
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4
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,
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FIG. 3.-Floor plan of lobby area and ground level.
-'IT .6
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..
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'1
..
FIG. 4.-Level A (underground level). Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 64(2) April 1976
183
CARSON AND BOBICK
FIG. 5.-Floor plan of level A (underground level).
:.t~ ~ ~ ~
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..
FIG. 6.-Lounge area.
184
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Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 64(2) April 1976
_. . v^., i^. _ i.t
SCIENCES LIBRARY, BROWN UNIVERSITY
concrete, plastic furniture, lacings of a colorful spectrum, and supergraphic numbers painted in the stairwells. The ground level of the Sciences Library is a glass-walled lobby (Figs. 2-3) which contains a central circular enclosure of shiny red plastic, housing the reserve collection (and the circulation desk) on the interior arc and providing exhibit cases on the exterior surface. The reserve desk is slate, like the flhor, with a plastic laminated top curved at the edge. The lobby is draped with large, ceremonial-looking orange and purple canvas banners designed to shade the sun. The main reading room, accessible by elevator or free-standing stair tower, is the red-carpeted mezzanine, cantilevered over the lobby. Level A (Figs. 4-5), the floor below the lobby, is the main working library floor of 25,000 square feet. All reference services as well as the current periodicals collection, staff work areas, offices,
conference rooms, lounge area (Fig. 6), and spacious study areas are located on this underground floor. The entire floor is carpeted in a graphic treatment with gray aisles between bright orange "islands." Rugged, ribbed, buff-toned concrete walls continue the architecture down into this subterranean space. Concrete beams and coffers are painted white to achieve maximum reflective light. Levels three through thirteen contain the books and bound periodicals, classified according to the Library of Congress system, and shelved alphabetically in call number order. Generally each of the major science collections has at least one and sometimes two floors. The tower form, which until recently has been an anathema to librarians, was accepted in principle with the stipulation that the typical floors of the tower would have sufficient area to house the largest separate collection (medicine) on not more than two floors at 45,000
libmikon 1! I
g ''"' L'' ,,
.,.
..
'.' ' 2' '? FIG. 7.-FIOOr plan of typical stack level.
Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 64(2) April 1976
185
CARSON AND BOBICK
volumes per floor with room for an appropriate number of carrels, lockers, faculty study areas, conference rooms, and other necessary facilities. Figure 7 shows the basic plan of levels three through thirteen. On most floors the offices and conference rooms are at the north end of the building while carrels surround the stacks on the other three sides. Rest rooms for men and women are on alternate floors from the mezzanine to level fourteen. In addition to offering an excellent view of Providence and its environs, the fourteenth floor contains a staff lounge, locked storage area, and computer terminals which make it possible to use the facilities of the Campus Computing Laboratory. Each collection has its own color painted in a broad band across interior walls. Directory stands and elevator signals are color-coded to the floors in a spectrum ranging from shades of red to shades of blue. Warner, Burns, Toan, and Lunde designed all the reading tables, carrels, card catalog cases, dictionary stands, bookshelves and counters for the library, all in light putty gray plastic laminate. These designs were made by Keller Furniture Manufacturing Company and are now distributed by Furniture, Furnishings & Equipment Associates. Other information on furnishings includes:
Lounge seating (Artemide plastic furniture): Thonet Reader chairs: Thonet (General Fireproofing, John Stuart) Carpets: Stevens-Gulistan ("Varatex") installed by Higgins of Boston Vinyl asbestos flooring: Armstrong Stacks: Ames Metalstack Office furniture: Steelcase. SELECTED FACTS AND FIGURES Architect: Danforth Toan Architectural Firm: Warner, Burns, Toan and Lunde (New York)
186
Interior Design: Gertrude Gray of Warner, Burns, Toan, and Lunde Landscape Architects: Sasaki, Dawson and Demay Engineers: Severud, Perrone, Sturm, Conlin, and Bandel
Construction: Reinforced poured concrete General Contractor: Dimeo Construction Company Ground Breaking: May, 1969 Building Occupied: December 1971/January 1972
Project Cost: $4,205,000 Building Cost: $3,611,500 Equipment Cost: $327,350 Gross Area: 122,000 square feet Net Assignable Area: 77,250 square feet Percent Assignable Area: 63.32 Square Foot Cost:$29.60 Book capacity: 450,000
Current Number of Volumes: 245,000 Current Unbound Serial Titles: 3,900 Current Bound Serial Titles (Annuals, etc.): 700 Major Collections: Biology, chemistry, physics, mathematics, engineering, geology, medicine, and psychology Typical Monthly Book Circulation: 7,673
Seating Capacity: 600 Carrels: 303 Faculty Studies: 24 Conference Rooms: 10 Typical Monthly Attendance: 25,880 Book Lockers: 140
Staff: Appointed Librarians: 7 Supportive Personnel: 16 Student Assistants (FTE): 47
Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 64(2)April 1976
CARSON AND BOBICK
dicals. By July 1971 the collection had grown to 85,000 books and bound periodicals. The first spurt in growth in the biological sciences came after World War II. In the fifties, and especially after Sputnik, the growth in the biological sciences assumed a geometric progression, an experience that was similar throughout the country. Increased undergraduate and graduate enrollment, additional faculty and research projects all had their impact on demands for library materials and services.
neighboring Pawtucket. (Affiliated hospitals now number eight.) In order to permit elective clinical experience for medical students and continuing medical education programs for practicing physicians, the program has recently entered into associations with eight additional institutions. LIBRARY COOPERATION
Cooperative efforts with hospital and health sciences libraries were not a new concept and had been an on-going activity since 1952. Long before MEDICAL EDUCATION PROGRAM phrases such as consortium, out-reach, and By 1959/60 planning began for the addition of cooperative sharing had come into vogue, hospital medical education, to consist of the first two years and health sciences librarians from Rhode Island of medical school. To the already strong basic and nearby Massachusetts had been meeting incollection of some 800 journals were added ap- formally six to eight times a year for the purposes proximately 800 medical journals. Gifts from the of acquainting themselves with existing collections U.S. Surgeon General's Office, the College of and personnel and for providing assistance when Physicians and Surgeons of Philadelphia, local needed. The first evidence of the cooperative nahospital libraries, and the scientific community ture of this group was a Union List of Medical formed the retrospective holdings for new serial Journals, published in 1953. Since then, six other editions have been published; the seventh edition subscriptions. The medical education program which began in was published in April 1975. In addition to the union list, duplicates are 1963 was designed as a six-year program. A graduate from this program obtained an M.M.S. offered first to all hospital and health sciences lidegree and could then transfer to a four-year braries in the state, and then to a wider audience. medical school for the clinical years, end his Assistance, both formal and informal, has been formal education with this degree, or enroll in a given to new librarians. In all of these ventures, Ph.D. program. the Biological Sciences Library assumed a de Another highlight of the sixties was the facto leadership role. The basic philosophy for emergence of the Division of Biological and operation was that in order for the group to be Medical Sciences on July 1, 1965. This was the strong, each member should become as strong as result of the merger of the Departments of possible; true cooperation is based upon the Biology and Botany with the emerging program in maximum strength each unit can provide. medical education. When the Countway Library of Medicine, the Administrative reorganizations in April 1968 regional medical library for region I, chose the and January 1973 clearly defined the responsi- area resource libraries to back up the smaller bilities of the Division of Biological and Medical units, the Biological Sciences Library was asked Sciences to undergraduate concentration pro- to be the area resource library for Rhode Island. grams in biology and medical sciences, and a In essence, this formalized an on-going cooperamedical education program which included under- tion which had been in existence since 1952. graduate, professional, and post-doctoral proMEDICAL DEGREE PROGRAM grams. The medical education program is now a sevenAFFILIATION AND COOPERATION year program, taking high school graduates On February 3, 1969, Brown University, a through to the M.D. degree. This is an extension Rhode Island educational corporation, signed a of the six-year M.M.S. program which operated statement of affiliation with five hospitals: Rhode between 1963 and 1973. The first five years are Island Hospital, Roger Williams General Hos- basically the same as in the M.M.S. program, pital, The Miriam Hospital, The Providence Ly- followed by a fifty-six-week period of hospital ing-In Hospital (now called Women and Infants clerkship, plus a seventh year of elective Hospital of Rhode Island), all located in Provi- experiences: university courses, research, or tudence, and Pawtucket Memorial Hospital, in torials with practicing physicians in a hospital or
180
Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 64(2) April 1976
SCIENCES LIBRARY, BROWN UNIVERSITY
ambulatory care setting. The first M.D. degrees were awarded in June 1973. THE SCIENCES LIBRARY By 1959 the Biological Sciences Library was already an overcrowded facility, even though the gifts of older volumes of medical periodicals were in storage. The allotment of the basement floor alleviated the situation for a few years. However, it was soon evident that all periodicals prior to 1930, and then prior to 1950 and eventually 1960 and 1965, would have to be stored at the opposite end of the campus, with paging done on a daily basis. Throughout the fifties various possible locations for a new Biological Sciences Library were investigated and then discarded.
.-
is--
By 1959 the nature of interdisciplinary teaching and research at Brown University pointed strongly and definitely to the need for a sciences library which would bring together library materials in all scientific disciplines. A proposal for a grant to support the construction of a sciences library was submitted to the National Science Foundation on November 27, 1959. Planning for the new library began in 1960. On July 24, 1967, an application for a joint construction grant was received by the Department of Health, Education and Welfare, for that portion of the library which was to constitute the Medical Sciences Library. The decision to include the Medical Sciences Library as a unit of the Sciences Library is a reflection of the basic
_
FIG. I.-Exterior of Sciences Library. Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 64(2) April 1976
181
CARSON AND BOBICK
philosophy of the medical science program at Brown, namely, that the medical education curriculum should be embedded in the general university curriculum. It is therefore argued that there are positive advantages in having the medical library functioning within the library of sciences to maximize access to the research collections in the basic sciences which serve as a foundation for the medical sciences and clinical medicine. Ground for the construction of the Sciences Library was broken in May 1969. The library was opened in December 1971 and represented the consolidation and merger, under one roof, of all the library holdings of the two divisional sciences libraries. THE BUILDING Danforth Toan of Warner, Burns, Toan, and Lunde designed the Sciences Library to be a spatial pivot point and intellectual symbol for the university's science complex. Standing like a giant bookstack among surrounding science department buildings, the library looks exactly like what it is: a repository of research materials. Eleven of the building's fifteen floors are devoted to stacks, with the north and south facades resembling book-
shelves with their exposed concrete floor beams and solar bronze glass (Fig. 1). In a purely architectural sense, the building expresses its truth at a glance: four massive concrete towers at the corners visibly delineate the structure of the building, and their load-bearing role is emphasized by vertical ribbing of buffcolored concrete; smoother concrete is used between the towers and for beams. The towers, which enclose elevators and stairs, are set out from the building in order to render the interior spaces entirely free of columns and thus achieve maximum efficiency in use. To preserve the impact of the tower rising straight from the ground, the architects put the largest, and busiest, space underground. The lower level covers five times the area of the tower. Sunken courts at the four corners of the building provide daylight and landscaped views to the underground interiors. Warner, Burns, Toan, and Lunde also designed Brown University's John D. Rockefeller, Jr. Library which was dedicated in 1964. That library houses the social sciences and humanities collections; the interiors emphasize woods, fabrics, and leather. By comparison, the tone of the Sciences Library is brisker and more utilitarian. Its interiors contrive a "scientific look" with exposed
FIG. 2.-Lobby area.
182
Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 64(2) April 1976
SCIENCES LIBRARY, BROWN UNIVERSITY
X.1flT
'E
L z3.
-
II
4
6
A
,
2
-
FIG. 3.-Floor plan of lobby area and ground level.
-'IT .6
A-,
., V. ii4,05., - _ .p .f:.
4r
:.0
.ic
..
X: -:kl.:,
'1
..
FIG. 4.-Level A (underground level). Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 64(2) April 1976
183
CARSON AND BOBICK
FIG. 5.-Floor plan of level A (underground level).
:.t~ ~ ~ ~
s~ .;
.. Oil ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
w
.. .: . :
..
FIG. 6.-Lounge area.
184
..:
...:
.. ....
:s;. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~.'....
'...'..''..' t '~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~... ......
Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 64(2) April 1976
_. . v^., i^. _ i.t
SCIENCES LIBRARY, BROWN UNIVERSITY
concrete, plastic furniture, lacings of a colorful spectrum, and supergraphic numbers painted in the stairwells. The ground level of the Sciences Library is a glass-walled lobby (Figs. 2-3) which contains a central circular enclosure of shiny red plastic, housing the reserve collection (and the circulation desk) on the interior arc and providing exhibit cases on the exterior surface. The reserve desk is slate, like the flhor, with a plastic laminated top curved at the edge. The lobby is draped with large, ceremonial-looking orange and purple canvas banners designed to shade the sun. The main reading room, accessible by elevator or free-standing stair tower, is the red-carpeted mezzanine, cantilevered over the lobby. Level A (Figs. 4-5), the floor below the lobby, is the main working library floor of 25,000 square feet. All reference services as well as the current periodicals collection, staff work areas, offices,
conference rooms, lounge area (Fig. 6), and spacious study areas are located on this underground floor. The entire floor is carpeted in a graphic treatment with gray aisles between bright orange "islands." Rugged, ribbed, buff-toned concrete walls continue the architecture down into this subterranean space. Concrete beams and coffers are painted white to achieve maximum reflective light. Levels three through thirteen contain the books and bound periodicals, classified according to the Library of Congress system, and shelved alphabetically in call number order. Generally each of the major science collections has at least one and sometimes two floors. The tower form, which until recently has been an anathema to librarians, was accepted in principle with the stipulation that the typical floors of the tower would have sufficient area to house the largest separate collection (medicine) on not more than two floors at 45,000
libmikon 1! I
g ''"' L'' ,,
.,.
..
'.' ' 2' '? FIG. 7.-FIOOr plan of typical stack level.
Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 64(2) April 1976
185
CARSON AND BOBICK
volumes per floor with room for an appropriate number of carrels, lockers, faculty study areas, conference rooms, and other necessary facilities. Figure 7 shows the basic plan of levels three through thirteen. On most floors the offices and conference rooms are at the north end of the building while carrels surround the stacks on the other three sides. Rest rooms for men and women are on alternate floors from the mezzanine to level fourteen. In addition to offering an excellent view of Providence and its environs, the fourteenth floor contains a staff lounge, locked storage area, and computer terminals which make it possible to use the facilities of the Campus Computing Laboratory. Each collection has its own color painted in a broad band across interior walls. Directory stands and elevator signals are color-coded to the floors in a spectrum ranging from shades of red to shades of blue. Warner, Burns, Toan, and Lunde designed all the reading tables, carrels, card catalog cases, dictionary stands, bookshelves and counters for the library, all in light putty gray plastic laminate. These designs were made by Keller Furniture Manufacturing Company and are now distributed by Furniture, Furnishings & Equipment Associates. Other information on furnishings includes:
Lounge seating (Artemide plastic furniture): Thonet Reader chairs: Thonet (General Fireproofing, John Stuart) Carpets: Stevens-Gulistan ("Varatex") installed by Higgins of Boston Vinyl asbestos flooring: Armstrong Stacks: Ames Metalstack Office furniture: Steelcase. SELECTED FACTS AND FIGURES Architect: Danforth Toan Architectural Firm: Warner, Burns, Toan and Lunde (New York)
186
Interior Design: Gertrude Gray of Warner, Burns, Toan, and Lunde Landscape Architects: Sasaki, Dawson and Demay Engineers: Severud, Perrone, Sturm, Conlin, and Bandel
Construction: Reinforced poured concrete General Contractor: Dimeo Construction Company Ground Breaking: May, 1969 Building Occupied: December 1971/January 1972
Project Cost: $4,205,000 Building Cost: $3,611,500 Equipment Cost: $327,350 Gross Area: 122,000 square feet Net Assignable Area: 77,250 square feet Percent Assignable Area: 63.32 Square Foot Cost:$29.60 Book capacity: 450,000
Current Number of Volumes: 245,000 Current Unbound Serial Titles: 3,900 Current Bound Serial Titles (Annuals, etc.): 700 Major Collections: Biology, chemistry, physics, mathematics, engineering, geology, medicine, and psychology Typical Monthly Book Circulation: 7,673
Seating Capacity: 600 Carrels: 303 Faculty Studies: 24 Conference Rooms: 10 Typical Monthly Attendance: 25,880 Book Lockers: 140
Staff: Appointed Librarians: 7 Supportive Personnel: 16 Student Assistants (FTE): 47
Bull. Med. Libr. Assoc. 64(2)April 1976
