The details
Justine Markowski, a senior associate and architect for PGAL, presented a series of renderings simulating a walkthrough of the new facility for commissioners, Markowski said. The $16.5 million project came about through a land swap agreement between the county and Howard Hughes for the Grogan's Mill Village Center. Howard Hughes agreed to construct the new facility at the village center in exchange for ownership of the existing South Montgomery County library property at 2101 Lake Robbins Drive in The Woodlands.
What else?
According to previous Community Impact reporting, the new combined library facility located at 7 Switchbud Place in The Woodlands will have 48,000 square feet of space, which will be tailored to various age groups and community needs.
The library will include:
- A special children’s area fully separated from the rest of the library with an enclosed space
- An enclosed young adult room
- A podcast room
- A 3D printer
- Multiple workrooms
- A 100-person, theater-style classroom
- A modern conference room
- A boardroom
- Several meeting rooms
- A multifunctional meeting hall/ballroom
- Enhanced facilities
- A meeting hall for daily senior meals, voting and other activities
"This is a very exciting project," Precinct 3 Commissioner James Noack said. "I know the people are going to love it, and it's going to be best library and community center, not only in the county, but it's going to be the best in the state; it's amazing."
"This is your first experience at the building and has very large, high ceilings; large, high windows to bring in a lot of light," Markowski said of the entrance. "This is really to act as a transitionary space, so you either go right to the library or left to the community center. This space you can sit wait for your family members on either side; it will have art, and then there will also be some exhibition art ... where you can change out either local art or school art or however the staff wants to use the space, so really this space is really meant to be a reflection of the community."
"This kind of thing doesn't come along very often to be able to provide such a community-focused building," said Kim Lan, Howard Hughes Director of Development. "Construction is going well. With any renovation you're always on the lookout for the unexpected, but it's been fairly minimal, so we're very happy with that, and everything's on track to be done by next summer.
Stay tuned
Framing construction is already underway and work on the front facade of the building is scheduled to begin within the next few weeks.
