A new home for the Rego Park Library in Queens, N.Y., officially started construction on Dec. 9 with a groundbreaking ceremony attended by several members and representatives of the borough.
The project is a ground-up replacement of the aging 50-year-old branch at 91-41 63rd Drive.
Designed by Weiss/Manfredi, an architectural firm based in New York City for the Queens Public Library (QPL) and managed by the city's Department of Design and Construction (DDC), the $39 million structure will be more than double the size of the existing library, a squat one-story brick building with only 7,500 sq. ft. of space.
The current facility will soon be demolished and replaced with an 18,000-sq.-ft., three-story library, expanding space for programs, learning and community engagement.
The Rego Park branch has consistently been one of QPL's busiest branches, ranking among the top in checkouts, visits and computer use, a workload that has increasingly strained the building's limited footprint.
For years, staff and local officials have pointed to the branch's popularity as evidence that the small facility could no longer keep pace with demand for program space, technology access and dedicated areas for children and teens.
Now that the demolition and construction of the new facility has started, the Rego Park Library is closed. However, QPL will operate a mobile library on-site and direct patrons to nearby branches. Queens Public Library will provide its mobile service at the site beginning Jan. 8.
"Rego Park has grown and changed significantly since the current branch opened [in 1975], and we are thrilled to begin construction on a spectacular new library with double the space, modern amenities and a commanding street presence," QPL President and CEO Dennis M. Walcott said at the event.
The Architect's Newspaper noted Dec. 15 that the library's renderings show a compact, three-story building wrapped in jade-colored brick, its surface marked by a cadence of tall vertical windows that sweep around both street-facing elevations. The openings will stretch across double height reading rooms inside to create long bands of daylight. At ground level, the facade will pull open at the primary entrance, where a recessed section of glazing will reveal an interior stairway.
Within the new building, Weiss/Manfriedi's design organizes circulation around the broad central stair paired with an elevator, linking the lower-level multipurpose room, the ground-floor adult areas and the children's floor above.
The reimagined Rego Park Library will feature three full floors of programming space. The lower level will include the main multi-purpose room along with a dedicated teen reading area. The ground floor will serve as the primary hub for adult reading and resources, while the second floor will house a bright and welcoming children's area and a smaller multi-purpose room dedicated to programming for youngsters.
The general contractor for the new library building is Stalco Construction Inc. of Hauppauge, N.Y. Construction on the new building is expected to be completed in late 2028.
A low-maintenance green roof will top the structure, while high-efficiency lighting and mechanical systems, on-site stormwater retention and a highly insulated envelope are planned to bring the building in line with contemporary sustainability standards. The project is targeting LEED Silver certification for environmental sustainability.
The Rego Park project sits within DDC's long-running Design and Construction Excellence Program, which pre-qualifies design firms to streamline procurement for civic buildings. Through the program, the city has delivered other recent branch libraries in Far Rockaway, East Flatbush, Inwood and The Bronx.
"The new Rego Park Library has a remarkable design that will make it a standout in the community, and it features environmental sustainability features to reduce environmental impacts and the burden on local water, sewer and electrical systems," said DDC Acting Commissioner Eduardo del Valle in a prepared statement. "I think you will agree that it's been worth waiting for. We have a growing portfolio of projects for Queens Public Library, and those projects contribute to learning and community cohesion for everyone in Queens."
When it is finally open again, the library also will feature a wall installation as part of the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs' (DCLA) "Percent for Art" program.
Artist Katrin Sigurdardottir's mural, entitled The Fore, will be a continuous piece of art covering approximately 1,500 sq. ft. of three interior walls and featuring images created through an innovative modular brick system. Inspired by halftone printing and digital dot-matrix structures, specially contoured bricks alternate with standard bricks to form patterns that come together to reveal striking, large-scale images on the walls and transforming the building into a dynamic, visually engaging canvas.
The images are of plants that are native to Queens and which the artist has previously foraged and used to make paper, similar to the paper that makes up books in a library.
"The new library in Rego Park has been a long time coming and I'm thrilled that its reconstruction is finally moving forward," said U.S. Rep. Grace Meng. "It is an honor to join members of the community to help break ground on this crucial and exciting project. As a local library user and the mom of two children, I know firsthand the essential role that libraries play in our borough. All communities deserve a modern facility with updated resources, especially heavily used branches such as the Rego Park location. I hope the new building is built as quickly as possible and I look forward to its completion so that constituents in Rego Park can take advantage of all that it will have to offer for many years to come."
Rego Park's Library One of 66 in Queens
Queens Public Library is one of the largest and busiest public library systems in the United States, dedicated to serving the most ethnically and culturally diverse area in the country. An independent, non-profit organization founded in 1896, QPL offers free access to a collection of more than 5 million books and other materials in 50 languages. Each year, the Library hosts tens of thousands of online and in-person educational, cultural and civic programs and welcomes millions of visitors through its doors.
With a presence in nearly every neighborhood across the borough of Queens, the QPL consists of 66 locations, including branch libraries, a Central Library, seven adult learning centers, a technology lab at the Queensbridge public housing complex, a community learning center at the Ravenswood public housing complex and five teen centers. It also has four bookmobiles and two book bicycles.
