Judges of Competition
The advising architect, necessary in case of a competition, and often called in when another architect has been selected for a very large problem, is generally taken from among the heads of architectural departments of universities or technical schools, though one authority suggests that sometimes a prominent architect in actual practice might be a more up-to-date judge. As has been already said, he formulates and guides the competition and acts as chairman of the jury to award prizes. Sometimes more than one architect is asked to serve on this jury, with unprofessional citizens of artistic taste.
But very rarely is any prominent librarian, almost never a considerable number of expert librarians, named for the jury. Here, however, they ought to have especial influence. They can at least prevent bad blunders. As a librarian who had recently served on such a jury confided to me, “All we could do, of course, was to pick out the plans which had the fewest faults from the library point of view.” The least a board of trustees could do, it would seem, after handicapping their library by a competition, would be to let expert librarians have a large share in picking out the plan. But perhaps they would want utility too much, and the real object of a competition is only outside show, of which the librarian is not a better judge than the average man.
If the trustees wish above all to have a good working library, they ought to ask to serve on the competition jury, one prominent librarian who has built, and one prominent librarian of some library of the grade and class which is to be built, and give especial weight to their opinions.
Order of Work
The building committee having been chosen, the librarian being in charge, the adviser selected, the architect appointed, the cost provided for, and the site chosen, it is time for planning to begin.
The first step should be to inspect the site together, and let the architect (without letting his mind anticipate details) say what form of building would best suit site and neighborhood,—tall or low, broad or narrow, four equal-sided, or front and rear, occupying whole lot, or leaving skirts for air, light, and quiet.
If the committee should approve his first impressions, the next thing to do is for librarians to find the cubic contents that funds will allow (see chapter on Cost[159]), get from the architect his idea of how many stories there would better be, with the height of each (including basement), and possible pitch of roof. Then, getting tentatively the height of the building, divide the cube by the height, to approximate the floor area.