The new Moelis Family Grand Reading Room, part of the Van Pelt-Dietrich Library Center at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, lives up to the adjective in its name. The 5,500-square-foot space, formerly occupied by a periodicals library, is a place for focused study, in the tradition of grand European reading rooms. Its setting—in a 1962 Modernist brick building (by Harbison, Hough, Livingston & Larson, now known as H2L2 Architects/Planners) that houses the larger library center—provides grandeur of its own, with 20-foot-high ceilings and double-height windows on three sides that offer abundant natural light and views of the campus.
With a rich but understated palette of materials and forms, Gensler sought to create an atmosphere of luxurious calm when asked to reimagine the existing space. In collaboration with the Philadelphia firm The Lighting Practice, the architect devised a lighting scheme tailored simultaneously to the large space, to individual readers, and to a monumentally scaled, three-panel wool-and-silk acoustical mural, Fields of Transformation, by the Dutch artist Claudy Jongstra. Additionally, given the soundreflective quality of the windows, it was crucial that the space was adjusted to be “pin-drop quiet,” says Peter Stubb, Gensler’s design director for the project.
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