Road Trip! - Auburn University

Welcome to the first edition of Library Riot’s Library Road Trip, a series of excursions to libraries of all stripes, complete with pictures and commentary to boot. Now in all fairness, there isn’t really any rhyme or reason to which libraries I visit — I generally just try to find one nearby when I’m out of town, then I walk around, snap some photos, and talk with staff if possible.

A couple weeks ago, I visited the Ralph Brown Draughon Library (abbreviated to the RBD) at Auburn University. I was there before finals had started, so the library wasn’t exactly jam-packed, nor was that there much hustle and bustle in the study carrels and on the tables. (Finals are going on as I type this, so chances are that it’s a not-so-quiet place for now.) Even with that said, there were a lot of students using the library, especially the computers (from what I could tell, mostly for word processing and Internet access). In addition to the active student presence, library staff — all quite friendly and approachable! — were manning the Reference Desk on the second floor and the Help Desk in the Special Collections department on the first.

One of the things that impressed me the most about the RBD Library is the way they use signage and marketing. While their strategies aren’t necessarily ground-breaking, the vast majority of their signs are phrased positively and designed to be colorful and professional-looking (even when, say, warning that an area is reserved for quiet study). Auburn also does an excellent job of extending the “cat” theme, including AubieCat (the library catalog) and CopyCat (printing and publishing services, located in the RBD lobby).

In any case, it’s nice to see a library (especially an academic one) getting used by its community, and I’m guessing that RBD is certainly appreciated by its faculty and students alike. And as an added bonus, the grounds outside the library are pretty, open, and inviting, with benches and trees to complement the rest of Auburn’s beautiful campus.

You can check out the whole set of pictures on Flickr. Kudos to the folks at Auburn for designing a pretty sweet library and for doing a great job of serving their university community.

Very special thanks to Auburn grad student Mel Voynich for showing me around!