On Tuesday, June 9th, the St. Louis County Library celebrated the grand opening of the Clark Family Branch. The Clark Family Branch is a stunning, 2-story building, 74,000 sq ft., and is the largest branch in the St. Louis County Library District. The day activities consisted of a ribbon cutting ceremony, story time and DIY craft, storybook character scavenger hunt in the new children’s area, and tours and demos in the teen creative lab, and live music by the band, Bird Seeds.
This is a huge milestone for the St. Louis County Library District as this is the final branch of the Your Library Renewed Campaign, which began in 2014. The branch features several unique spaces including the Post Event Space & Plaza, which opened in June, Stephany & Richard Kniep Children’s Space, Emerson and Genealogy Center, Unity Foundation Teen Space, and the Small Business Center.
Stephany and Richard Kniep Children’s Space
The Stephany and Richard Kniep Children’s Space, sponsored by Stephany and Richard Kneip, features a large playhouse, a fire engine, and other interactive learning activities.
Emerson History and Genealogy Center
The Emerson History and Genealogy Center offers the entire SLCL’s collection of approximately 125,000 items. It includes six interactive Family Search screens and a Memory Lab where families record their family history.
Unity Foundation Teen Space
Unity Foundation Teen Space provides teens access to a creative lab sponsored by Object Computing Inc., including a 3-D printer, a recording studio, a green screen wall, and a video game room. Other amenities include a Glowforge laser cutter, Cricut, Black Magic Cinema Camera, and Mac computers loaded with the Adobe software suite.
Small Business Center
The Small Business Center includes a variety of resources for small business owners. This area in the library has movable walls to help create collaborative spaces. There’s also a Virtual Meeting Space with soundproof walls.
Faith Group is working with ICS Construction Services in cooperation with the St. Louis County Library – Clary Family Branch to provide commissioning services.