Expansion of the library

The Wimberley Village Library expansion and renovation project was on full display last week at an open house attended by around 200 people.

When finished, the project will essentially double the size of the library with an entirely new wing adding 8,500 square feet.

“The building expansion will be off to the north,” Dennis Lee, member of the building committee for the Wimberley Village Library, said. “It adjoins the existing library via an enclosed bridge structure that attaches to what is now the adult fiction area of the library.”

The bridge structure is expected to have a coffee bar and chairs seated in a glass exterior looking out towards FM 2325.

“It was our intention to blend the old – what someone called the cottage-in-the-woods look – with a more modern, flashy feel,” Lee said. “The expansion wing will showcase a lot of wood and glass, with some stone facades and the paint scheme will match the old building.”

The new space will house the children’s area, which will double in size. It will also have dedicated spaces for teens, a craft lab and demo kitchen. There will be a large multipurpose room that would be capable of holding around 100 people. This expansion will also open up the ability to renovate other portions of the current building with the intent on adding three more meeting spaces for smaller groups.

“The intent is to offer this to the community, as we have been, for free,” Lee said. “…We are looking to have dedicated spaces to do that sort of stuff, so the adults can have a quiet area and the kids can make noise or we can have a meeting with 100 people without reconfiguring the library. As the Wimberley area has grown, we have noted a need for the change in resources. We have programs right now where we are teaching Spanish to people. Occasionally, we have English-as-a-second-language classes or career counseling. We have senior chair exercise or yoga classes, but we only have one small 20-by-20 room to do anything we want to do in. So if we want to hold those types of classes under this new arrangement, we will have the space.”

The project will also reconfigure parking onsite. The entrance to the library will remain the same, but the parking will wrap around the new construction to the north and exit at the stop light at Green Acres Drive.

The library is hopeful construction will start in the late summer or early fall and finish within a year. Since the expansion project will largely take place next to the library, regular library operations are not expected to be significantly impacted.

The library district has taken out a loan for $5 million for the project and the Wimberley Village Library Foundation has so far raised around $650,000.

The library has enough money for the expansion portion of the project but rising construction costs have meant that money is still being raised for the renovations.

Donations can be made on wimberleylibrary.org or by dropping a check by the library made to “Wimberley Village Library Foundation.” All monies contributed to the foundation will go to this project.