On September 29, 2012 the Santa Clarita Public Library division welcomed a new branch to the city, in the heart of the valley, complete with a Ribbon Cutting Ceremony and a speech by former Mayor Frank Ferry. For Santa Clarita, a new city library had been long overdue. With taxpayers and local donations funding the project, Old Town Newhall kicked their beautification program into high gear with $29 million dollars that had been collected for their biggest investment and project of 2010; the new Old Town Newhall City Library. After two and a half years of construction, the Old Town Newhall Public Library was handed over to the people of Santa Clarita as an environment to satisfy curiosity, create young readers, stimulate imagination, visit a comfortable place, understand how to find, evaluate and use information, connect to the online world, and succeed in school. The new library was built to give people the ability to find books and media materials to enrich their lives and minds. With fabulous elevated ceilings, this architectural design would blow any construction artist off their high-rise. The new library is more an artistic expression than a place to simply rent books or go to study quietly. This is because the library was also created to provide a community meeting place and a civic focus for residents of Santa Clarita and surrounding areas. Beginning with the outer aesthetics, horizontal planks accompanied by layered stone foreshadow a thematic shell of what visitors will see once they step inside. Juxtaposed with extended straight lines and strong geometric shapes observed in the patio, windows, and roofing, the Old West meets the 21st century at the Newhall Public Library. Making your way into the entrance, a rustic stone fountain sits atop a cascading set of steps, keeping consistent with the motif seen in the architecture of the building itself. Once community members step through the threshold of glass to enter the library, they are awe struck by the homey, yet sleek, layout of the brand new state-of-the art Old Town Newhall library – a 30,000 square foot facility that offers more than 135,000 literary items, 68 public use computers, private study spaces and meetings rooms. Adorning the walls are memorabilia of Western history and pop-culture. Enlarged images of cowboys like William S. Hart and paintings of American icons like Howdy Doody decorate the rooms. The rooms! Like models chosen out of a modern home furnishing catalog, the multiple color schemes and furniture themes scattered throughout the different studying and lounging areas give visitors a feeling of excitement, wondering what will lie behind every corner of the library or what is to come at the end of a long hall of bookshelves. Additional highlights of the library include a children’s library, teen study area, a fireplace reading area, an outdoor courtyard, art and photographic displays, an artistic replication of Beale’s Cut and original works of art. However, this intricate Mecca of knowledge and modern art did not just come to be on its own. The process began with months of comprehensive planning and community survey until, the planning Committee, in cooperation with the public, agreed on a set of goals and principles which the city’s third library would be founded upon. The Old Town Newhall Public Library had to provide a place that would give young adults, as well as adults, in Santa Clarita the literacy skills necessary to lead fulfilled and productive lives. It was imperative that in the library, students would find library materials and services designed to help them succeed in school. The Santa Clarita Public Library is not simply a place to rent books, but provide you and your family with excellent customer service and make sure your library experience, both online and in the three branches, meets all of your expectations.
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