An innovative solution...!

The Library is getting new carpeting! Hooray! The pattern, by the way, is called "Einstein" and thus we can guarantee that everyone who walks on it will come out of the library smarter!

I met today with our installer and we discussed many logistics about the project, including how the sequence of installation will proceed throughout the whole building while we attempt to stay open through the course of the work. We must empty each room of books, bookcases, furniture, and computers so that the new carpet may be laid. This is indeed a weighty problem! Think of just the Children's Room for a moment: aside from all the desks, tables, chairs, picture book bins and bookstacks, about 20,000 books will need to be removed (and hopefully kept in some semblance of order out in the adjacent corridor so we can find things) for a couple of days. This will be a very difficult period for those of us who love order (and what librarian doesn't?) so we beg your patience and your endurance as we look confused and bewildered as we detour you around the library in September.

Then I hit upon a radical temporary solution for getting all the books off the floor. Here it is:


What do you think?
Will it work?

(This is actually from an art exhibit at the Tate Gallery in London. It's called "False Ceiling" and was created in 1995 by British sculptor Richard Wentworth. These are all second-hand books suspended from steel wires and Wentworth has been called "the scrap dealer of British Art".)

Hmmm.......What if we asked every library cardholder in Dover to come in and check out 5 books each? That would pretty much clear out all our volumes!

Seriously, we will keep you posted on this blog and on Twitter, as soon as we know, about the schedule of carpet installation and what areas of the library will be affected on each day of the project. With a good sense of purpose and a better sense of humor, I'm sure we can all live through this together!