Transforming Libraries into Dynamic Civic Networks for Immigrant Communities
Location: Sunset Park, Brooklyn, New York
This project reimagines the Sunset Park Library as a hybrid civic hub and a network of "urban living room libraries" embedded in underutilized lots along 4th Avenue. By balancing formal institutional spaces with informal urban commons, the design addresses the needs of immigrant communities and a gentrifying neighborhood. Centralized hubs are opened for flexible programs, while redistributed books transform vacant spaces into platforms for cultural exchange, education, and leisure, redefining libraries as accessible and adaptive spaces deeply integrated into daily life.
Models | Concept model and building models
Hybridized Urban Typologies | Sunset Park Commercial Overlays
Sunset Park is a neighborhood where immigration, acculturation, and economic necessity dissolve traditional boundaries between residential, commercial, and public spaces. Research into the hybridized commercial overlay zones on 5th and 8th Avenues reveals how informal economies, makeshift public spaces, and improvised commercial overlays emerge as practical solutions to meet the urgent social and economic needs of immigrants.
Drawing 01 | Types to Anti-Types: Commercial-Residential Hybridization in Sunset Park
Drawing 02 | Integrated Verticality: Confronting tensions in 4th avenue
Part I | Extending the Library to the Avenue
This proposal reimagines 4th Avenue as an extension of the Sunset Park Library, redistributing books and resources to Urban Living Room Libraries embedded within the neighborhood. By decentralizing knowledge and activating satellite hubs for cultural exchange, skill training, and community interaction, the library moves beyond a single institution to become an integrated network of accessible, localized spaces that better serve the immigrant community and strengthen resilience against gentrification.
Drawing 03 AND Concept MODEL | Sunset Park 4th Avenue library network proposal
The traditional dewey decimal system is reimagined into four categories: Cultural Exchange, Skill Training, Learning, and Wellness. These interventions address the diminishing Public in a gentrifying sunset Park while redefining Public for Immigrant Communities as Spaces that are accessible, dynamic, and integrated into daily life
Drawing 04 | Urban Living Room Libraries Isometric
Drawing 05 | Workshop Library Section Perspective
Drawing 06 | Urban Living Room Libraries Plan
Rendering | Workshop Library perspective
Transform underutilized, narrow lots in 4th Avenue's Commercial Overlay zones into urban living room libraries—localized public spaces that foster community inclusivity and resilience. Measuring under 17 feet wide, these irregular parcels, unsuitable for housing, become pocket public spaces addressing the growing need for accessible communal hubs amid gentrification
Part II | Integrating the Avenue into the Library
Centralizing books within a core opens surrounding spaces for flexible programming, transforming the library into a dynamic public commons. Open axes, pocket spaces, and vertical elements like communal reading rooms and mezzanines enhance integration with the street, blending formal library functions with the vibrancy of urban life to serve Sunset Park's diverse community.
Drawings | Re-IMAGINED sunset park library with centralized book core
Renderings | Sunset Park Public Library Perspective
Models | Concept model and building models
Model | Workshop library