Do The Right Thing: Save Our 1913 Library

To the editor:

I was born and raised in New Canaan and I am in the business of restoring and protecting historic structures. My father, Philip Rose, started, developed and ran the New Canaan YMCA for 30 years.
It is simply unnecessary and counter to the interests of a New England community to destroy a landmark building such as the Library.

Architecture is the art of meeting challenges presented by the land, regulation, the neighborhood, and the client, and history.

Failure to protect the original library building and incorporate it into an expanded facility that meets the needs of the community is a failure of town government to set priorities. It is not because it cannot be done, it is only because the owner, in this case, New Canaan Town Government, isn’t requiring it.

In an age where private property owners are subjected to regulation and intrusion into their private property rights in recognition of the importance of protecting historic structures and neighborhood character, it is nothing short of bizarre that the destruction of the original library building facade and mass is even being considered.

The entire legacy and evolution of the New Canaan library, from the original building to its subsequent additions and particularly the historic streetscape the Library presents to the north and east elevations should be protected for all future generations.

It is an American theme to upgrade and improve and often to replace but only through past failures have we come to value preservation as part of the need to evolve our buildings in this dynamic society and economy. To not improve and expand the Library to meet the needs of the community would be a failure of even greater significance, but it doesn’t have to require the obliteration of the past.

Any architect worth their salt can design an extraordinary expansion of the library for the community while incorporating and protecting the prior iterations of how those same needs were met in prior eras.

I would argue that an Architect that fails to find such a solution and fails to convince their client to set such priorities is a failure in their efforts. One could even wonder if such an architect is selfishly pursuing a plan they prefer for their own legacy than one that protects history. Certainly Centerbrook has proven they can do both.

On a grander scale, the New York public library has expanded, and is, successfully expanding its facilities and services for a vastly different city than when the building was originally built. But they accomplished it while protecting the landmark building facades that are so important to the cityscape. They even found a way tp protect the iconic bookshelves that were so unique and important to the library’s history.

What is New Canaan’s excuse? If the original library is lost it will rest on the shoulders of those that failed to protect it.

Doing the right thing is not always obvious, but it is this time!

Eric M. Rose