For the second summer in a row, communitecture is working with Tivnu: Building Justice to construct small-scale installations for communities across Portland, Oregon. Tivnu is a Hebrew word that connotes right-action of a constructive kind, and this organization works to involve and activate teens from across the country by bringing them to Portland each summer to engage in a wide spectrum of service-learning projects.
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This year, in early July, we built three little libraries. First we bring the community hosts together with the teen-participants to discuss design ideas, issues of materials and scale, site locations and other considerations. Next, the participants draw up designs and present them to the hosts. Then we are ready to build!
With a small mountain of recycled wooden materials from the ReBuilding Center, we built three little library projects in a single day. Each library was built by a team of 3 to 4 participants who learned how to hold and use construction tools over the course of the day. One library turned out to be a miniature stage for puppet-scale displays, another was tall and vertical for large children’s books, and the third was quite huge and designed for a full-spectrum of shared items, including books.
With a small mountain of recycled wooden materials from the ReBuilding Center, we built three little library projects in a single day. Each library was built by a team of 3 to 4 participants who learned how to hold and use construction tools over the course of the day. One library turned out to be a miniature stage for puppet-scale displays, another was tall and vertical for large children’s books, and the third was quite huge and designed for a full-spectrum of shared items, including books.
The following day, the teens took each library to its final community destination. One was in NE at a tea house, another in SE in a suburb, and the third was in the inner SE Brooklyn Neighborhood. These participants had never dug such deep and exact holes before, especially in the hard dry earth of summer, so they shared the task and quickly installed each project in a safe, stable, and permanent fashion.
These are small but extremely powerful projects. What this diverse group of teens built is a fantastic genesis each library’s story, facilitating teamwork and learning through service and partipation. And then the hosts of each little library will embellish and fill them until they are quite unique and appropriate for their community.
At this time last year (summer 2013), there were just over 9,000 little libraries that had been installed and registered in the world. Now there are more than 15,000! This is a quiet, constructive, doable movement to change the world through direct and creative community building. Free Little Libraries seem to be spreading with no signs of stopping!
These are small but extremely powerful projects. What this diverse group of teens built is a fantastic genesis each library’s story, facilitating teamwork and learning through service and partipation. And then the hosts of each little library will embellish and fill them until they are quite unique and appropriate for their community.
At this time last year (summer 2013), there were just over 9,000 little libraries that had been installed and registered in the world. Now there are more than 15,000! This is a quiet, constructive, doable movement to change the world through direct and creative community building. Free Little Libraries seem to be spreading with no signs of stopping!
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