Warner Library (Tarrytown, N.Y.)
Unlike many small libraries across America that were built with funds from Andrew Carnegie, Warner Library was built with private funds and named after a local prominent family. Designed by architect Walter Dabney Blair, the library‘s construction began in 1928 and was finished early the next year. Blair also designed the bathhouse at Kingsland Point Park in Sleepy Hollow, the public library in Charlottesville, Virginia, and various buildings on the University of Virginia campus. Warner Library has been described as “... the purest example of classical Grecian architecture in the community.”
The 9,800 square foot Warner Library was constructed of Vermont limestone in a Neo-Classical Revival style. Among the many architectural details are intricate scrollwork around the outside of the building, a stone front portico with a triangular pediment, ionic columns, and fifteen-foot windows. Two finely sculptured Greek urns flank the front steps of the Library. The front door is a decorative bronze panel brought from Italy.
The entrance hall is where the stacks and the circulation desk are located. Off to either side are rooms, two on the left and one on the right. These rooms are entered through large, arched doorways. Currently, the right room houses the fiction collection. Directly opposite, the left room is a large, proper reading room, with overstuffed chairs, a couch, a fireplace, and a grandfather clock. The room behind the reading room has tables where groups can meet and work.
The original design of the stacks suggests that they were once closed, meaning that users would have to request books at the circulation desk, which staff would then retrieve. The stacks were once confined to a small area on three floors, reached by narrow staircases. The floors of the stacks are inelegant, suggesting again that this area was probably once limited to staff.
After several renovations, a modern addtion was added to the library In the 1970s. This addition was added to the back of the building, thereby more than doubling the space. This addition was not examined.