Exhibition:

Reimagine Your Public Library

Through June 2023

CAB Studio at the Chicago Cultural Center, 1st Floor East

Libraries have always served as a place for communities to gather and learn. Today, libraries in many cities have become places for residents to receive mutual aid, take fitness classes, a place for students to get lunches over the summer, and to receive healthcare screening services…the list goes on. This year commemorates the 150th anniversary of the Chicago Public Library. Since its founding in 1872, there are now more than 77 Chicago Public Library branches across the city. Each library offers unique programs and services that reflect the needs of their communities.

The exhibition Reimagine Your Public Library, by Chicago-based nonprofit Human Scale, invites the public to consider and share their definition and experiences of public space to imagine the future of our libraries 150 years from now. How are public spaces produced? Who produces them? What types of places exist to support the sharing and exchange of knowledge? How can we use design as a tool to inform the future of our libraries to create spaces and solutions that are specific to communities?

Human Scale is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization with the mission of creating functional, beautiful and meaningful public spaces in historically disinvested neighborhoods. Their approach is centered around giving community members agency in the design build process in order to create unique and long-lasting projects. Since 2017, they’ve worked in eight neighborhoods throughout Chicago, most of them in the South and West sides of the city.