The Globus Design Associates Blog

Designing Libraries is a Broad Design Specialty

I was speaking to a recent graduate who posed a question I get asked frequently: Is specializing in designing libraries confining?

Ocean County Library. Interior Design: Globus Design Associates. Photo: Suzan Globus

Designing library interiors encompasses so many functions within one building, that they demand a variety of specialized design knowledge.  In public libraries alone, the interior designer must design these specialized spaces:

• offices and workspace for staff
• delivery and materials processing area

• early childhood play space
• conference rooms
• tech classrooms
• lecture, concert and performance space
• places for quiet, singular study and contemplation
• group study areas
• places for social interaction
• food service area
• public restroom
• art and crafts areas

And in many cases:

• coffee house
• film screening room
• retail space

These are some of the areas routinely included a public library which are considered design specialties in their own right. It is easy to understand why designing libraries offers such diverse interior design challenges that I feel it is a broad specialty.

Holiday Outing Sparks Design Inspiration

We decided to keep it local for the GDA annual holiday outing this year and selected the Hunterdon Art Museum as our destination.  Located in a 19th century stone mill, the building is listed on the National Trust of Historic Sites.  The museum is situated in a quaint setting
in historic Clinton, NJ.  Some of us were as equally interested in the views to the outside as of the exhibit.

Val and Alden taking it in. Photo: Suzan Globus

Photo: Suzan Globus

The paper exhibit showcased the work of Pamela Becker who used paper for her constructions.

Linen and paper coiled bowls by Pamela Becker.  Photo: Suzan Globus

Wall hanging representing the four seasons by Pamela Becker. Photo: Suzan Globus

Artists using fire, smoke or explosion to create art exhibited their works on the second floor.

I'm still wondering how this artist controlled the smoke to acheive these circles.  Photo: Suzan Globus

The work of some of the museum members was exhibited on the third floor.

This nearly photographic quality portrait was executed in charcoal.  Photo: Suzan Globus

Afterwards, we walked up the street to The Garden Gourmet where Chef Briellen is cooking some memorable hearty, local fresh fare in an unassuming storefront.  We had a waterfront table in the cozy upstairs and rolled down afterwards to select some exceptional baked goods from her first floor bakery.

Design Lessons Learned:

1. Use familiar materials in new ways.

2. Experiment with unconventional substances, like smoke,  to create unknown effects.

3. Good design is always around if you can train yourself to recognize it.

4. Good local food, well prepared is always inspirational.

Waterfowl Festival Exhibits Good City Event Design

Planning for the day when Americans gather around a table featuring a fowl seems like an appropriate time to look at the plan of another fowl based event, the annual Waterfowl Festival held Nov. 11-13 in Easton, MD.  The town wide event is a marvel of event design.

Cars are prohibited in the center of town. Photo: Suzan Globus

The fine arts are exhibited in secure venues.  Photo: Suzan Globus

Free busses take festival goers to and from off-site venues.  Photo: Suzan Globus

Where vendors, Photo: Suzan Globus

and competitors exhibit.  Photo: Suzan Globus

Regional food is plentiful.  Photo: Suzan Globus

Local non-profit organizations are given the opportunity to provide food. Photo: Suzan Globus

Several groups of musicians provided a variety of entertainment.  Photo: Suzan Globus

Judging from the people and dogs, it is a successful event for the town. The people and the dogs deserve another post.  Until then, Happy Thanksgiving.

 

Green Eats-Supporting Sustainability through your Stomach

Small plate of fresh corn, limas, soy beans and oyster mushrooms over home made pasta from the Staunton Grocery. Photo: Suzan Globus

I don't talk about why I became a vegetarian unless asked because it seems to make people uncomfortable. What one ingests is a private affair, but food is inextricably related to sustainability.  The short story for me is that after ruining my appetite from deboning a raw chicken 20 years ago, I started reading about the environmental impact of food, especially beef, production.  The trigger book was Diet for a New America, 1987, by John Robbins, the heir of the Baskin-Robbins ice cream fortune. My self education about the relationship of food production to the environment and spiritual reflection lead me to a decision to stop eating meat. 

I am very happy to see that more people have begun to contribute to the conversation and production of sustainable food.  It enables me to search for restaurants when I travel under the heading of "local food".  That usually gets me to restaurants who are cooking with local ingredients and using local suppliers. I've found some great results. Here are a few standouts:

1. The Staunton Grocery Staunton, VA.  This unassuming storefront restaurant is turning out some exceptional food in a small, historic Virgina town. Staunton, VA at sunset. Photo: Suzan Globus

2. Cochon New Orleans, LA. This may seem like a surprising pick for a vegetarian, but this restaurant, who's name translates to "pig" features well prepared authentic regional cooking. Those are decent search words if you are looking to eat green. By definition, if regional recipes are being used, they are based on food at hand. At Cochon, like Staunton Grocery, local wines and beers are also featured on their menus.

New Orleans street musician. Photo: Suzan Globus

3. Avec Chicago, IL.  This small wooden boite of a restaurant offers casual dining on serious cooking in a wine bar atmosphere with communal dining tables. The menu features fresh local ingredients used in Mediterranean inspired dishes. One of my favorite aspects of this restaurant is its ample offering of small plates because eating less food makes my health more sustainable.  Their site mentions that the restaurant is closed until September.  I hope this award winning restaurant continues to operate. Chicago geen. Photo: Suzan Globus

Associations  are springing up to encourage sustainability in food service, such as Dine Green. My selections are based on food supply alone, although both Cochon and Avec both appear to be built using natural materials in a minimalist setting and Staunton Grocery is employing a less is more approach to the restaurant's interiors.  The food industry has far to go in producing and supplying sustainable choices, but the restaurants are showing promise.

GDA Holiday Outing

Destination: Trenton, New Jersey?

Each year, I take my staff on a holiday outing to "a place of design interest".  This vague description gives me leeway in selecting our field trips. This year we found some surprising visual treats in Trenton.

Not exactly the design capital of the world, you say?  In the early 1800's, it was the ceramics making capital of the world and earned this landmark sign which I look forward to seeing when returning from Washington, D.C. by train.

 

We toured a small gem of a museum Ellarslie, The Trenton City Museum, housed in an 1848 Italianate mansion.

Photo by Suzan Globus

The museum is located in Cadwalader Park, a 100-acre park designed by Frederick Law Olmsted. It deserves a return trip in the spring to see it in bloom.

 

Ceramics are the foundation of Ellarslie's permanent collection and include examples from the highly collectible Fulper, Stangl and Trenton potteries as well as Lenox and Boehm porcelains, all products of Trenton factories. 

Photo by Suzan Globus

The vibrant complimentary colors in this Stangl Sunburst pattern were riveting.

Photo by Suzan Globus

This Lenox porcelain coffee service, with Art Deco influences and a Canadian inspired painted design, offers a frigid contrast to the Stangl pottery shown above.

We capped off the day sharing wonderful northern Italian dishes such as homemade squid ink pasta in one of Trenton's many eateries.  Without my colleagues, GDA would not be able to deliver such great service to our clients and it certainly wouldn't be as much fun doing it.  Our holiday adventures remind me how lucky I am. Happy New Year.