Pasadena Central Library, West Wing

When it comes to Pasadena's Central Library, there might be no better tour guide than Dan McLaughlin, Librarian, Archivist and Pasadena historian. Lucky me, I asked him for a tour and he said yes. He even held my book, Act As If, when I took his picture. (Which I did not ask him to do but I wasn't going to turn him down.)

Dan is also an author of novels, plays and history books, two of which I purchased at Art Night. You may remember Pasadena Pursuit, the Pasadena Museum of History exhibit he curated across the hall from Ann Erdman's Mystery History.

I'm working on my new novel and it takes place in a library. It might even take place in Pasadena. For research and inspiration, I hoped to snoop around, above and behind things in Pasadena's Myron Hunt-designed, 1927-opened, 130,000 square foot Central Library.

Let's start with the library's west wing, which is way bigger than I imagined it could be.

When you enter the door west of the check-out desk where it says "Staff Only," a corridor takes you past a coffee room and several offices. Pretty soon you come upon this long room where books are being checked in and catalogued. I'm standing near the west end of the room. The windows face out onto the parking lot. Does the purple protect workers and books from the sun? The door at the far end opens onto the hallway that leads from the parking lot into the library.

We're on the second floor now, right above where I was standing when I took the previous shot. I hope the employees don't mind me showing their lounge. I think it's pretty nice. Very roomy and comfy, with a kitchen off to the left. The coffee room on the first floor is a lot smaller. This one's more like a full kitchen.

I never knew about this and it's hiding in plain view! The walkway leads from the lounge to the office pictured below. You can look north over the parking lot and to the mountains from here. Next time I'm at the library, I'm going to look up from the parking lot and see if I can spot it.

We're looking toward the mountains. More purple. I'm gonna go with sun protection.

Dan asked me to be careful about taking photos of library patrons. "We like people to feel safe here," he said, "we protect their privacy." I don't think you can recognize anyone in this photo of the Main Hall, taken from the second floor balcony looking east. The Hall's floor is cork, to reduce noise. The woodwork is quarter-sawn oak.

An interesting tale about the chandeliers: they're replicas of the ones Myron Hunt designed for the building. Other lights were installed in the 1960's "which obscured the beautiful ceilings," and no one knows what happened to the originals. But Hunt had designed the same ones for the Huntington Library, and these are copies of the Huntington's.

I took about a million photos and I'll post more. But I want to thank the library staff right now, and especially Dan McLaughlin. I had hoped to be inspired by my tour and I haven't stopped writing since.

Do you want an architectural tour of the Pasadena Central Library? Yes, you may have one.