Architect: Louis Kahn Location: Exeter, New Hampshire General Contractor: H.P. Cummings Construction Company Structural Engineer: Keast and Hood Company Mechanical/Electrical Engineers: Dubin-Mindell-Bloome Associates Project Year: 1965-1972 Project Footprint: 12,321 square feet Photographs: Depending on the photograph:On Flickr: Ed Brodzinsky,yan.da,ryan_d_cole, Kiel Bryant, and offset. Drawings from greatbuildings.com References: Phillips Exeter Academy
In 1965 Louis I. Kahn was commissioned by the Phillips Exeter Academy to design a library for the school. The Academy had been planning the new library for fifteen years but were consistently disappointed with the designs that the hired architects and committee were proposing. The Academy was very particular in knowing the kind of building they wanted: a brick exterior to match the Georgian buildings of the school and an interior with the ideal environment for study. Kahn’s sympathetic use of brick and his concerns for natural light met these specific principles that the Academy had in mind for the library, and thus the design fell in his hands.
More information on Louis Kahn’s Phillips Exeter Academy Library after the break.
“The quality of a library, by inspiring a superior faculty and attracting superior students, determines the effectiveness of a school. No longer a mere depository of books and magazines, the modern library becomes a laboratory for research and experimentation, a quiet retreat for study, reading and reflection, the intellectual center of the community.… Fulfilling needs of a school expected eventually to number one thousand students, unpretentious, though in a handsome, inviting contemporary style, such a library would affirm the regard at the Academy for the work of the mind and the hands of man.”
People enter the 111′x111′ square library from the ground floor and climb up a grand set ofstone stairs to the first floor. Coming up the last step onto the first floor one can immediately perceive the relationship of reference area, circulation desk, and book stacks. Kahn found this aspect to be important so that visitors can easily understand the plan of the building upon their entrance.
Источник: places.arch-grafika.ru
Фото: places.arch-grafika.ru