1/11
New planting beds and seating along Houston provide a green zone of trees and grasses extending the library to the street.
2/11
New entry and canopy with original window openings restored to visually connect with the street.
3/11
New entry and canopy with original window openings restored to visually connect with the street.
4/11
Welcome and adult reading areas with new south-facing windows beyond.
5/11
White oak bookcases span above the floor, eliminating the seldom used bottom shelf.
6/11
Model view. Central space, formerly library offices and mechanical, is framed by a surround of bookcases suspended by the perimeter walls.
7/11
Breaks in the series of low white oak clad linear bookcases create reading and study spaces between.
8/11
Model looking north from adult reading to the new entry and canopy.
9/11
Section perspective. The facility consists of a large interior zone with high ceilings and a low-ceiling zone stretching along Houston Street.
10/11
Section perspective detail illustrating the scale of the new southern windows.
11/11
North elevation with new glazed entry, canopy and four large window that will reconnect the library with the street.

HAMILTON FISH PARK LIBRARY

New York Public Library, New York

Proposal 2013
Project 2014-19, 2021-22
Projected Completion 2023-24

Situated between Alphabet City and the Lower East Side and adjacent to historic Hamilton Fish Park, the Hamilton Fish Park Library restores and renews the 1959 modernist structure designed by Kelly & Gruzen. The facility was designed as part of a school complex (now NEST+m), and consists of a spacious central interior zone with high ceilings and a linear low-ceiling zone stretching along Houston Street. The renovation project opens up the high center of the space, transforming it into an adult reading commons by shifting existing enclosed office, community room and mechanical spaces to the building's perimeter. Substantial tapered concrete columns threading through the space to support the school above will be stripped and exposed, visually linking the unique faceted exterior structure to its interior counterpart.

Dedicated children and teen areas will be situated in the intimately scaled low-zone, enlivened by views to the newly landscaped street frontage and sidewalk, and illuminated with indirect northern light via new large windows. These previously blocked up windows, along with those on the branch's south, east, and west facades will be opened up and replaced with new, transparent windows, transforming the branch into a light-filled, active facility that better connects to the community it serves.

A new, more open and welcoming glazed entryway greets the public and is protected by a new cast-in-place concrete canopy that physically connects outside to inside. New insulation, energy-efficient systems and triple glazing (three of the project's NYC 80x50 program measures) combine to reduce the library's energy consumption.

Winner of the 2018 NYC Public Design Commission Award for Excellence in Design.

Rice+Lipka Architects
Principals: Lyn Rice & Astrid Lipka
Associate Principal: David Prendergast
Associate: Benjamin Cadena; Sr Project Architect: Joe Malboeuf
Sr Designer: Timothy Khalifa, Ahmad Khan
Project Team: Michael Choi, Safaa Alnabelseya, Alexander Crean, Shu Du, Rachel Kim, Yiyao Liu, Sara Martinez, Alice Song, Sidian Tu

Landscape: Starr Whitehouse
Structural: Silman
Environmental: Plus Group
Lighting: Shaver Architectural Lighting
Security, Technology, Audiovisual: Shen Milsom & Wilke