University of Pennsylvania Library
Subtitle: Frank Furness
By: Edward R. Bosley
Series: Architecture in detail; Architecture in detail (London, England)
Publisher: Phaidon
Published: 1996
Place of publication: London
Language: eng
Number of pages: 60
Subjects: Furness, Frank, -- 1839-1912; Fisher Fine Arts Library -- Designs and plans; University of Pennsylvania. -- Library -- Designs and plans; Library architecture -- Philadelphia -- Designs and plans; Academic libraries -- Pennsylvania -- Philadelphia -- Designs and plans; Historic buildings -- Pennsylvania -- Philadelphia -- Designs and plans; Philadelphia (Pa.) -- Buildings, structures, etc
Description: Cloaked in its brilliant mantle of brick, fiery terracotta and red sandstone, the University of Pennsylvania Library stands as the mature-period masterwork of Philadelphia's premier Victorian-era architect, Frank Furness. Conceived in consultation with two eminent library theoreticians, the library plan evolved from practical experience with the inadequacies of nineteenth-century library buildings; the result was a modern factory for learning, a machine for the use and storage of books.

Furness's rationalized plan, expressed on the exterior as a bold design, was challenged for decades, and anti-Victorian sentiment threatened the edifice with demolition as late as the 1960s. Renewed appreciation has since come full circle, however, culminating in a dramatic interior restoration by the eminent Philadelphia practice, Venturi, Scott Brown and Associates. Frank Furness's academic monument thus stands today as a defining architectural landmark of Philadelphia.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. 59)