Tour of Pierre Bottineau Public Library-Mpls.

Today board members(Lori Hopkins, Chuck Coleman), Sally Coleman, and I traveled to Minneapolis to tour a library in the Hennepin County Library system that was reclaimed buildings to create the Pierre Bottineau Library. The architects melded the old with the new wonderfully. They kept the character of the old buildings and added modern touches that really worked. We all felt that the building is beautiful and really fits in it's environment.

I especially loved the iron works inside and out. Two beautiful wrought-iron gates and iron fencing really adds charm to the library site. The skylight was a great touch along with the large spacious windows that let lots of light into the library. This library is also a "green building". This means that they kept existing tree for shade in the summer, high-efficiency HVAC, southeast orientation helped to maximize wintertime solar light, occupancy sensors decreased demand for lighting, end of day shutdown of systems to conserve energy. Sidewalks and bike racks were constructed to help encourage low-energy methods of transportation.

Pierre Bottineau Library is one of the newest old building in the Hennepin Library System opened in 2003 at the Historic Grain Belt campus.The 1893 Wagon Shed and the 1913 Millwright Shop and stables were reused and merged with a new structure to create a warm and welcoming state-of-the-art library. It is a lively neighborhood gathering place where people come to read, meet, and study.

The library and the nearby Bottineau neighborhood are named for Pierre Bottineau one of the most colorful characters in early local history. An accomplished guide, trapper, and trader, he spent the prime years of his long, active life opening up the Northwest Corridor communities of the Twin Cities metro area to settlement.