PS 19

2004

Public School Libraries, New York, NY

Modular components visibly combine, engaging students’ minds and forming libraries that otherwise would not exist.

Pro bono design for the Robin Hood Foundation: prototypical libraries in five New York City public schools.

Tsao & McKown faced the challenge of having to meet two contrary programmatic demands: the need for group instruction and activities, versus the need for there to be individual, solitary paths for intellectual discovery. The resulting design aimed to preserve the wonder and astonishment foster the wonders attainable by reading in private, while also celebrating communal activities. Bookcases, in all their iconic majesty, were used to define spaces for small reading groups and for individual refuge. Larger reading areas included a stage where students might have their first experiences engaging a larger group as a leader or performer.

Economical means of construction and sustainability were considerations which influenced the choice of materials and detailing. Simple, apparently unfinished aspects of design were intentionally employed to encourage young minds to fit the pieces of the library together as they would their own building blocks.

As part of this project, Tsao & McKown designed custom furnishings including the multi-functional ‘Flip/Flop Desk/Chair,’ a one-piece molded foam reading stool, and molded acrylic ‘cloud’ lights which simply hang below school-standard fluorescent strips.

CLIENT

The Robin Hood Foundation / NYC Board of Education

AREA

1,300 to 2,300 square feet (PS 19, PS 46, PS 86, PS 94, PS 246)

COST

Withheld by request

SCOPE

Interior Design, Furniture/Product Design

CONTEXT

Physical Context

Existing Space
Physical Context

Assigned Public Schools

PS 19

PS 46

PS 86

PS 94

PS 246

PROCESS / RESEARCH

Designing for Learning

Our project was about taking learning beyond information and into the realm of discovery and re-enactment. Learning can be a very private activity and learning can be a very public activity. We made areas where children can take a book and curl up and read it in private, and areas for group learning, sharing and acting, [including a] stage for participatory performances.

- Calvin Tsao and Zack McKown
Sketches and Notations
Drawings and Renderings
Furniture and Lighting

PRESS

Article

NY Times: Libraries Invite Young Readers to Check In

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Article

Architectural Record: The L!Brary Goes Back to School

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Article

Architecture: Reading Rooms

The Robin Hood Foundation and its band of merry architects are building libraries for New York City public school.

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Publication

The L!brary Book: Design Collaborations in the Public Schools

The L!brary Book takes readers behind the scenes of fifty groundbreaking library projects to show how widely varied fields and communities—corporate underwriters, children’s book publishers, architects, graphic designers, product manufacturers, library associations, teachers, and students—can join forces to make a difference in the lives of children. Based on the premise that good library design can actually inspire learning, the L!brary Initiative brings together some of the world’s leading architects to reimagine the elementary school libraries in New York City—the nation’s largest public school system.

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Article

NY Times: A Is for Artwork That Lures Bronx Schoolchildren to New Libraries

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Article

Bloomberg News: Robin Hood Foundation Raises Record $88 Million to Help New York City’s Poor

The Robin Hood Foundation gala, Wall Street’s largest single-evening fundraising event, raised a record of more than $88 million at its New York dinner last night to feed and clothe the city’s destitute. The sum, donated by more than 3,600 attendees including executives at Wall Street banks, hedge funds and private-equity companies, exceeded last year’s record of $72.7 million.

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Article

CNN Money: The Story of Robin Hood

How the leaders of the hedge fund world have banded together to fight poverty – taking gobs of money from the rich, applying strict financial metrics in giving it away, and making philanthropy cool among the business elite.

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