Location : Washington, D.C.

Client: Washington, D.C. Public Library, MLK Branch

Year : 2019 - Present

Status: In Progress

Collaborators: Studio Joseph, Openbox, Blue Cadet, Kubik Maltbie

What's past is present, in politics as it is in a physical place. The community design process for Washington, D.C.’s MLK Public Library recognizes the mission of the library to hold space for King’s story in Washington DC and for that story to be situated within the context of a contemporary space with much to offer to people facing contemporary challenges. Design has a critical role to play in the unique challenge of creating a space that generates dialogue about the life and legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr., and through foregrounding the strategies and tactics of the past, we create richer possibilities for understanding the present and fighting for a more just future. 

As an institution, the library has a unique and powerful relationship to the public it serves.  In centering justice through the process, design, and programming of this space, the library can establish new opportunities to support and amplify current and future movement work in DC, while grounding that work in the legacy of prior generations. Our approach is wto weave this clearly defined mission through all elements of the exhibition and our objective throughout the outreach, design, and fabrication of the exhibition will be to leverage the design process, final design product, and the exhibit content as centering collective agency in a call to action for systemic change.

Design Process

MLK + DC Permanent Exhibit

Our collective focus on King’s oratory brilliance often overshadows his ties to the efforts and impacts of grassroots organizing critical to making broad social change. The King and DC Exhibit is the central exhibition space of the library, where we amplify the voices of activists and organizers from the past, present, and future. The exhibition space showcase contemporary manifestations of the movement and providing a call to action that points toward the future. We will use the exhibit space as a forum for D.C. residents to share and visualize their own stories.

Temporary Exhibits

The pursuit of justice, whether in churches, basements, or libraries, requires a space for the exchange of ideas. The forms this exchange takes are infinitely varied, and thus the design of exhibition furniture should be flexible, to support as many modes of collective engagement as possible while maintaining a common visual connection to the permanent King exhibition reflected across the building’s center axis.

Welcome Wall

Libraries are all about the people that they serve, and about empowering those people to unlock the potential of the library. The Welcome Wall is an opportunity to communicate this mission of the Library at a civic scale. At this central introductory zone, visitors should be able to see reflections of their own stories and experiences, and in doing so, understand that this place is about our collective experience on a more personal level.