{"id":47005,"date":"2018-11-05T11:51:34","date_gmt":"2018-11-05T18:51:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/?p=47005"},"modified":"2018-11-05T11:52:47","modified_gmt":"2018-11-05T18:52:47","slug":"a-love-letter-to-the-city-new-library-draws-thousands-on-opening-weekend","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/2018\/11\/05\/a-love-letter-to-the-city-new-library-draws-thousands-on-opening-weekend\/","title":{"rendered":"‘A love letter’ to the city, new library draws thousands on opening weekend"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
Grand Opening: <\/strong>The New Central Library opened its doors to the public and saw many in attendance in downtown Calgary on Nov.1, 2018. (Photo by Darm Uppal\/The Press)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I<\/span>t may be early, but Calgarians are clearly over the moon in love with their New Central Library.<\/p>\n

O<\/span>ver the opening weekend Nov. 1-4 at the new library, on 3rd Street S.E., just east of city hall, the visually striking new structure attracted more than 42,000 visitors, according to information posted online by library officials.<\/p>\n

People entering the new structure for the first time could be heard expressing amazement at what they saw.<\/p>\n

And after taking a tour, visitors were still raving about the $245-million library.<\/p>\n

“It’s breath-taking,” said Donna Campbell, a SAIT library information technology instructor and former member of the public library board.<\/p>\n

“You can’t help but smile when you walk through that door,” Campbell said.<\/p>\n

The library is “our love letter to our city,” Ward 7 Councillor Druh Farrell Tweeted on opening day. Farrell is a member of the library board.<\/p>\n

Others were equally impressed.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s exactly what the city needed,\u201d says Brendan Conboy, a Calgarian who came to check out the library for himself.<\/p>\n

Conboy noted that it is so cold in our city for a large part of the year, so the city needs more indoor spaces like this to exist.<\/p>\n

He was mesmerized with the architecture and shape of the building, stating that the atrium was an elegant design.<\/p>\n

Conboy wanted to convey the message to all Calgarians to go and visit the library for themselves and experience all the features that make this library unique.<\/p>\n

On opening week, the library had fun activities set up for visitors to get them involved. Downstairs was an art room for kids and upstairs a balloon animal station was set up.<\/p>\n

Calgarian Nick Colins said the library \u201clived up to my expectations.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added that it was a well-designed infrastructure, and it was easily accessible for people to walk around with a lot of private spaces to study.<\/p>\n

Colins liked the fact that they have artist and author residencies and said he would like the chance to talk to one of the authors.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnything that allows us to interact is a good thing,\u201d said Colins.<\/p>\n

The new building includes a coffee shop inside of the library, a massive theatre space, a jungle gym for kids, a video-gaming room, artifacts and plenty of archives.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Fascinated Local: <\/strong>Stirling McMillan came with friends to explore the new library. McMillan, standing, at left, poses in the New Central Library on Nov. 1, 2018. (Photo by Darm Uppal\/The Press)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Stirling McMillan said that he didn\u2019t have any expectations for the library before he came to see it.<\/p>\n

\u201cI knew I was going to be blown away!\u201d<\/p>\n

He planned to explore the library and check out the old-fashioned typewriters that they had on display.<\/p>\n

But for McMillan said it was really all about people.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s like a centre-piece on a dining room table to gather around and converse.\u201d<\/p>\n

McMillan said there are plenty of books online, and everyone has internet, but here, all the archives are at people\u2019s fingertips.<\/p>\n

No amount of money would equate to all these things. – Stirling McMillan<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Anybody can open a drawer and see what kinds of brochures people used to have years ago. For example, they had the actual newspapers on display from the 1940s.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo amount of money would equate to all these things.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It may be early, but Calgarians are clearly over the moon in love with their New Central Library. Over the opening weekend Nov. 1-4 at the new library, on 3rd Street S.E., just east of [ READ MORE ]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":527,"featured_media":47017,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_ef_editorial_meta_text_assignment-slug":"S4 Calgary Central Library DU","footnotes":""},"categories":[3,212,4,711,13],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-47005","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-city","8":"category-downtown","9":"category-east-village","10":"category-featured","11":"category-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47005","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/527"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47005"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47005\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47131,"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47005\/revisions\/47131"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/47017"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47005"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47005"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47005"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}