Cascading Library
Metaphor in Stone
In Norwich, Connecticut, 56 miles east of New Haven, a waterfall erupts from the landscape in an otherwise placid, rural American setting. Flanked by violent boulders,
the Yantic River rushes 50 feet to the plunge basin, gathering momentum in a shocking display of raw natural power – a disruption of peace into chaos. The library, in proximity to such a boisterous condition, naturally responds to Yantic Falls
as a source of physical and metaphorical inspiration. By framing and choreographing
moments of exposure to the Falls throughout the building, the design entwines the
landscape and the architecture, the Cascading Library and Yantic Falls, in inseparable
mutual enhancement.
To this end, it felt appropriate to adopt “cascade” as the central metaphor for the design.
With connotations of both movement and intellectual pursuits inherent in the meaning,
“cascade” is an apt term for a library which aims to architecturalize an ephemeral state
into a formal language. This phenomenal essence affects every aspect of the place. In
the plan, programs are organized into sequences of stepped spaces which spill into
each other. Skylights offer a procession of luminous and spatial conditions. Finally, the
condition is apparent in the main reading room, where the walls and ceilings cascade
down like knowledge from the books stored above.
The library unfolds as a metaphor in stone. Spaces contract and expand, ascend and
descend, all striving to enhance the union between architecture and nature, knowledge
and space. The search for knowledge culminates in the dramatic vaulted hall that
frames the roaring waterfall – the reading room. Just like a waterfall, pursuit of knowledge necessitates the disruption of placid ignorance.