Keep Calm and Carry On
Imagine standing in the front door of the classic Hotchkiss Library, looking into an interior filled with shelves of books. Then imagine packing up those books, taking 10 percent of them to a new, temporary location, and putting the rest in cold storage while 128 years of wear and tear is swept away in a comprehensive renovation.
Finally, think about the future. How do you take all that history and refashion an iconic building designed by one of America’s preeminent architects to unleash its potential for the 21st century?
Those were the challenges facing Hotchkiss Library’s Board of Directors. Today, they have looked at all the issues, answered all the questions and launched an ambitious $3 million renovation and expansion project that will update the dream that Maria Bissell Hotchkiss had in 1893.
Hotchkiss, widow of Benjamin Berkeley Hotchkiss, one of the leading American ordnance engineers of his day, left his widow as one of the wealthiest women in the Northeast. She sought to perpetuate his memory by endowing Sharon and Salisbury with educational institutions. Sharon chose a library; Salisbury opted to create a private school.
Hotchkiss dedicated herself to the library project, down to the last detail of personally picking the exterior stone. She hired architect Bruce Price to design the building, a craftsman who came with an impeccable pedigree. Price designed the exclusive 7,000-acre planned community of Tuxedo Park in 1885, the Chateau Frontenac in Quebec, several other Canadian Pacific Hotels and numerous buildings at Yale. His work in Sharon still evokes sighs of esthetic appreciation from librarians across the nation.
Price’s involvement is one of the reasons today’s architects were excited about participating in the renovation project. “Bruce Price was a pre-eminent architect,” said Thomas Trowbridge, chairman of the Board of Directors. “When we sent out an RFP to architects, we got 18 responses. They were all dying to work with this fabulous building. It is a prize and what we want to do is preserve its legacy.”
To achieve that while bringing the library entirely into a modern world that provides patrons with more than just books, a 1,500-square-foot addition will be added to the rear of the building and some of the rooms in the older section will be reassigned. In keeping with the historic importance of the building, the addition will not be visible from the street. “It will be minimally intrusive,” said Trowbridge.
There will be one obvious change, according to Trowbridge. “When you entered the library the first thing you saw was the circulation desk. We felt that was kind of a visual barrier to the library. Price didn’t have it there and it will be moved back into the new addition so there will be an unobstructed view of the nave.”
In addition, he said, the floors will be refinished, the railings will be done, the lighting will be upgraded and “every facet of the gem will sparkle.”
Mindful of the changing uses of libraries, which now are as much as community centers as book depositories, the new plan calls for the rooms on the right and left of the entryway to switch roles. The room to the right has been the children’s room, while the room to the left was the reading room. In the new plan, the children will go to the left and the reading room will be reestablished on the right, replete with computers to aid in research. The Connecticut Room upstairs will also have computers.
At the rear of the building in the new addition there will be a room for children’s activities and community meetings, a lift to help less-mobile patrons to reach the main floor and handicap accessible restrooms. “Another benefit is that the addition can be closed off from the main library so people can have after-hour meetings,” said Trowbridge.
Despite many generous donations, the fund drive is still $300,000 short of its $3 million goal. Add to that the fact that Covid has led to cost escalation and that labor is hard to find. Nevertheless, Trowbridge is hopeful that the project can be completed for the proposed $3 million.
“We’re optimistic,” he said, “but we have to recognize that there could be things we didn’t count on that might exceed it.” On the plus side, he said the community has embraced the project whole-heartedly. “We’re hoping to get the Town to kick in toward project,” he said.
He sees the library continuing to fulfill its traditional as well as its new purposes. “People still read books,” he observed. “I was in the new location in the American Legion building on New Street and people were coming in all the time. It is actually a little more accessible that the library and we are hoping that more people will stop by to get books.”
In the meantime, work is progressing on the venerable building and may be completed this fall. To date, Trowbridge said, the most difficult part has been moving the heavy bust of Benjamin Berkeley Hotchkiss to a safe location while the work progresses. “He wouldn’t move,” Trowbridge said wryly. “He’d obviously had a big lunch that day, but they finally got him moved.”
When all is finished, Benjamin and the books will be moved back in, the doors will be flung open and Maria Hotchkiss’ gift to the town will again shine.
