Robert Hoag Rawlings Library

Rawlings Library is a transformative addition and renovation of the 1965 McClelland Library, providing expanded collection and community spaces. In addition to the library’s 300,000 item general collection, Western History, and genealogy collections, the project includes exhibition spaces, a top floor event space, vault, café, meeting, and study rooms.

Located in Southern Colorado on the Arkansas River and at the base of the Wet Mountains, the City of Pueblo is considered an important cultural and geographical crossroads of the Southwest. The project’s angular and ascending forms and materiality serve as an abstraction of and careful response to this natural and cultural landscape. The interior of the building is shaped by building wings housing collection and program spaces that radiate around a sculptural civic lobby on each floor, complete with a grand staircase and glass elevator tower.   

The building is designed as a landmark spanning across Mesa Junction, with materials such as bronze, warm toned concrete, and glass composed in dramatic sculptural form. Rising five stories, the library is sited above downtown Pueblo, oriented for views over the Arkansas Valley and historic downtown Pueblo to the east, as well as distant mountain views such as Pikes Peak to the north, the Wet Mountains to the west and Greenhorn and the Spanish peaks to the south.

In collaboration with Antoine Predock Architect