municipal

Ashland Public Library Restoration

While at Burt Hill, Saam principal Ed Bourget worked with library planner Adams & Smith on the Ashland Public Library, a Carnegie library built in 1904 on land donated to the town by Abner Greenwood. Located in the center of downtown Ashland, it has pedestrian access to downtown neighborhoods and municipal parking across the street. A modest addition was built in 1963, but the building had become very inadequate for a growing suburban town of 15,000.

The expansion project creates a 22,800-square-foot addition and renovation. The building was expanded to the back with frontage on a side street. The addition is very large in relation to the original building but is concealed by a three-story commercial building adjacent. On the west side of the original building, a new entrance provides barrier-free access, with an elevator connecting the first and ground level floors. The replanned building includes new areas for young adults, reference, browsing, and restored reading rooms on the first floor, and a greatly expanded Children’s Room and new meeting space on the ground floor.

The exterior of the addition takes its cues from the original building, using the palette of materials from the original design. The library is quadrupled in size, but the deferential massing of the addition preserves the character of the original library as a key element in the townscape.