Phillips Academy—Andover
Oliver Wendell Holmes Library

The Oliver Wendell Holmes Library is an academic and social center for the campus community. The renovations of the Library building allow it to function as an integrated learning hub, responsive to the changing ways students and faculty access information, and encouraging new forms of inquiry, learning, research, and collaboration.

Our design restores historic spaces in the original 1929 building and repurposes all spaces in its 1987 addition. Book stacks are condensed, relocated, and replaced by collaborative learning areas and group study rooms. A gallery space is repurposed as a global innovations studio. The Academy’s special collections are relocated to the main floor, making them visible and accessible to students. An expansive new makerspace supports exploration of data modeling and physical fabrication methods. These and other changes throughout the building make possible a 50% increase in student seating without enlarging the building’s footprint.