In the presence of special guests, including John and Carmen Thain, generous donors of the Thain Family Café and William H. Wright, II '82, for whom the Wright Reading Room is named, President Richard C. Levin and University Librarian Alice Prochaska will host the dedication of the Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Library on Friday, November 30. In conjunction with the dedication, we are excited to announce two public events that day featuring five engaging and exciting artists and visionaries who will speak on the architecture, design, and decoration of the Bass and Yale University Libraries. The events are free and open to all. Please join us on November 30 as we celebrate the official dedication of the newest library at Yale University.

Aric Lasher, Principal with Hammond Beeby Rupert Ainge, will give an overview of the place that the decorative arts have in the Bass Library, whose scope encompasses the ceramic tile frieze, the Kent Bloomer Studios sculptural embellishment of the Sterling staircase and the entry pavilion, as well as the design of windows, textiles, and furnishings. He will describe the process through which the design for these elements was developed, including that of the wall-hung textiles which Odegard, Inc. has been engaged to produce. Stephanie Odegard, founder and President of Odegard, Inc., will offer a detailed discussion that will follow the creation of the hangings from the refinement of the design through selection of colors and botanical sources for dyes, through the dying, tweeding, and weaving of yarns, to the final steps of finishing and trimming the tapestries. The story of these tapestries crosses continents, with work undertaken in Switzerland and Nepal before returning to New York City, and supports a broader social and economic mission affecting the communities in which they were produced.

Robert A.M. Stern, J.M. Hoppin Professor and Dean of the Yale School of Architecture, Cesar Pelli of Pelli Clarke Pelli, and Thomas H. Beeby of Hammond Beeby Rupert Ainge, will discuss the architecture and design of the Yale Libraries. Both Pelli and Beeby are former Deans of the Yale School of Architecture. Beeby was also the lead architect of the new Bass Library at Yale, formerly the Cross Campus Library, which opened on October 19. Laura Cruickshank, Yale University Planner and a member of the American Institute of Architects, will moderate the symposium.

From the Collegiate Gothic majesty of James Gamble Rogers’s Sterling Memorial Library to Gordon Bunshaft’s cool and modern Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library to the new warm and inviting Arts and Crafts-influenced Bass Library, Yale’s twenty-two libraries represent the spectrum of architectural design, theory, and craftsmanship over the last seventy-five years.

Contact: Geoffrey Little

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Page Last Updated: 11/24/2009