Ahead of its opening Monday, crews are working to put the finishing touches on the New Hanover County Public Library’s main branch in downtown Wilmington.

The library’s self-checkout machines arrived Thursday, and some labeling and cleaning still need to be done, but the facility is otherwise ready for the public, said Dana Conners, director of the New Hanover County Public Library system, during a media tour on Thursday morning. The library will open to residents Monday, following a ribbon-cutting and dedication at 2 p.m. 

The new library is part of Project Grace, a $77 million redevelopment of a New Hanover County-owned block bordered by Chestnut, Grace, North Second and North Third streets in downtown Wilmington. The library will share its building with the Cape Fear Museum, which is expected to open next summer.

After entering the new library, users will pass by the circulation desk and shelves for new book releases and holds. The library’s children’s area is located in a space just below. It features books for a range of ages, a play area and a room for children’s programs. 

Conners said the new space is a better fit for the library because it was designed around the needs of children and their families.

“The old space was confined because it was just off to the side and had been a department of the department store that was there, so we were constrained by the architecture,” she said. “This space is big. It’s wide open. You can stand at the desk and see the entire space. There aren’t any tall shelves to block your view, windows, tall ceilings, and it's a hard-surface floor, which is great for messes and spills.”

Conners said she wants to challenge perceptions that libraries always have to be quiet places.

“One of the reasons the children's department is removed and a little down from everything else is so that we can have a lot of noise,” she said. “The ceiling tiles will capture some of the noise. But again, we're not looking for that ‘shhh’ factor.”

The bulk of the library’s adult and teen collection (shown at left) is located up a flight of stairs from the first floor, along with the library’s local history room and study and conference rooms.

The collection includes books from the former library, which was located on the Chestnut Street side of the block, and some new books. Library staff spent over a year going through the library’s collection to make sure its books were clean and up-to-date, Conners said. That means the new library has fewer books on its shelves than the former location.

“It's a normal part of what libraries do,” she said. “We were just a little more aggressive as we moved into this building to make sure that the entire collection was reviewed.”

Staff also spent about two years reviewing the library’s local history archives before making the move to the new building. Conners said they hired a consultant to help the library better understand what they were collecting, evaluate their collection development policies and define what should be considered local.

After the review, the library gave some of its collections to the University of North Carolina Wilmington, Conners said, and also developed better ways to access materials.

“You can have all the archives in the world, but if you don't know what you have, people can't access them,” she said. “So we created finding aids and catalogs and all the metadata to figure out what we have so we can find it easily on the shelf.”

The second floor also includes four study rooms, available on a first-come, first-served basis, and two conference rooms that can be reserved by local nonprofits. One of the conference rooms can seat eight people, while the other seats 20.

There are also public-use computers, a printing station, magazines, newspapers and reference books, plenty of seating (second-floor seating shown below at right) and what Conners called a “laptop bar” that overlooks the building’s lobby. The second floor also houses the library’s teen collection and an updated space designated for teenagers.

“If you remember our teen space at the old library, I always say (it was) kind of like high school detention,” Conners said, “so this is much better.”

She added that library staff approached the design of the new facility with flexibility in mind. The shelves in the children’s area, for example, are on caster wheels, which could allow staff to reconfigure their layout.

“Things change, things evolve. We tried to be as flexible as possible with the furniture that we picked out, with the shelving, with everything that we're doing here so that if we need to pivot, we'll be able to do that easily,” Conners said.

Throughout, the library features walls of windows that usher in lots of natural light. The windows have fritting, which looks like stripes, that aim to prevent bird collisions and reduce the amount of heat from sunlight, Conners said.

When it comes to foot traffic and circulation, the main branch has historically ranked third behind the Northeast and Pine Valley public libraries. Conners thinks the new facility could change that.

“We have stuff here for everyone, all age groups, programs, books, materials, computers, resources on our computers,” she said, “and more importantly, we serve as a place where people can come and be with other people.”

New Hanover County's partners on the project are Wilmington-based Cape Fear Development, architecture firm LS3P and Monteith Construction. Ownership of the former library space is expected to transfer to Cape Fear Development in November, New Hanover County Communications Coordinator Alex Riley said Thursday. Cape Fear Development officials told the Business Journal this week that the company is currently working on plans for private development on the site.

Correction: This version of the story updates the total cost of Project Grace.