Makeover Artists Dust Off an Old Classic

Don't Judge Library By Its Cover; Inside, SE Branch Is Hip

For those who think chain bookstores, with their lounges and cafes, have made public libraries irrelevant, the District's Southeast branch might change some minds.

"I first walked in here, and I said, 'Wow!' " Julia McKnight said on a recent Tuesday afternoon, as she sat alongside her friend, Iesha Mack. The 14-year-old girls had spent most of the sunny summer day in the library, planted in front of one of two dozen new computers installed at the recently reopened building.

Under their feet, new carpeting was patterned with the alphabet. A few yards away, a reading area offered comfortable chairs upholstered in a colorful motif of geometric shapes. Even the bookshelves looked modern and hip, with sides featuring digital photographs of trees and plants.

Had the Fab Five from "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" paid a visit?

No, just a bunch of librarians and a visionary architect.

The 1922 red-brick public library in Capitol Hill, the second-oldest neighborhood branch in the city and one of the first funded by philanthropist Andrew Carnegie, went through an extreme makeover this spring.

"It was a downright miracle," said Ginnie Cooper, chief librarian for the D.C. Public Library. The renovation, which took seven weeks, certainly had a magical quality worthy of Harry Potter.

The new look came courtesy of Library Journal magazine. Each year, the trade journal chooses a branch library in the city hosting the American Library Association's annual conference, which was in Washington last month. The branch is decked out as a decorators' showcase during the conference, giving convention-goers an opportunity to see new products in a real-world setting. Most of the products and services are donated or sold at a steep discount.

Transforming the Southeast branch was a challenge, as it is larger than the two previous libraries that underwent makeovers. Last year, Library Journal refurbished a small branch in New Orleans, a show of support for a library system devastated by Hurricane Katrina. Two years ago, the group modernized a library in the New York City borough of Queens.

The District's Southeast branch had a pack-rat aesthetic, with books crammed everywhere and little light streaming through partially blocked windows.

"We really had crowded every single square inch with a place to house books," Cooper recalled.

For the makeover, librarians started by weeding the collection and taking down taped signs.