By exploring the future of libraries in the digital age, this thesis argues for a library that focuses on the exchange of ideas, resources, conversations, thoughts, beliefs, and skills. The artifact created to condense the core ideas of the thesis, is designed as a game intended to encourage learning through participation, socialization, exchange, and collaboration. The metaphor of the seed, which is one block, and the bloom, which is the end product of placing the blocks together, is imagined to prompt users to have informal conversations within the space of the library.

 

Growing the bloom through the building process will also allow users within the library to collaborate and develop skills such as teamwork, communication, sharing ideas, and decision-making, and leading a cooperative effort. The use of color to create a mosaic and the variabilities of the structure allow for greater creative expression and challenge that forces one to problem-solve and think ahead through its configurations.

 

As interactions between different demographics decline in cities such as Brampton, where ethnic neighborhoods go through the process of spatial assimilation, their relationship with people of other cultures is reduced. Hence, the creative engagement with The Bloom becomes an activity that transcends language and cultural barriers for Brampton’s diverse residents, who can come together and share their unique experiences and perspectives through the activity, which would help create a space of cultural exchange and understanding. The construction of the blocks started from gluing three one-inch clear pine trims together and cutting them to blocks of 40mm x 40mm. The blocks were then placed on a jig and passed through a table saw at an angle and rotated on each face until all sides had a V cut in them. The blocks were then put on another jig and sent through a dado stack blade on each face, which trimmed away the center of the block. They were then individually sanded and painted one of seven colors before being coated with mineral oil to protect them.

 

The box, in contrast to the vibrant blocks, is constructed out of a series of monochromatic quarter-sawn white oak plywood that is banded with white oak wood.

 

The final object is a deceptively simple box containing a world of possibilities that serves as a tray onto which people can come together to assemble multi-coloured blocks into endless configurations.