Wisconsin: “Makerspace: Madison Public Library Sees Innovation Centers as a Key Part of its Future”

From The Capital Times:

When Trent Miller realized that Madison’s Central Library would be a vast empty building for a brief time — after the collection was moved out and before demolition for a renovation began — the library gallery coordinator knew he had to organize a major art show.
“Bookless,” the resulting one-day, one-night 100-exhibiter art show and fundraiser that closed out the main library building’s original incarnation in January, drew an estimated 5,000 people.
Library staff were already at work designing a media production lab for the new library, teen services librarian Jesse Vieau tells me, when Bookless took place. The enthusiastic reception for the event, where partiers splashed the walls with graffiti before they came down, ate, drank, danced and posed by the hundreds in a photo booth, convinced Vieau and Miller that technology could be used for so much more in the library’s next life.
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Public libraries all over the country are embracing innovative ways of letting community members share their skills with one another, says Laura Damon-Moore. She is a co-creator of The Library as Incubator Project, a blog on library innovation begun as an assignment at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Library and Information Studies. The project, with its blog, Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest presences, now draws thousands of regular visitors.

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See Also: Learn More About the New Central Library in Madison, WI.

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