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Garden to Grow Library’s Uses

Say goodbye to the stretch of grass behind the Sister Bay-Liberty Grove library. By next summer, the space will be in transition from regular lawn to educational, sustainable, user-friendly garden.

“It’s going to be something the community can show off,” said Virginia Phelan, member of the Sister Bay-Liberty Grove library committee. “Something other than goats on a roof.”

The green stretch of lawn behind the Sister Bay-Liberty Grove Library will be transformed into an educational, sustainable, user-friendly garden by next summer. Photo by Len Villano.

The Sister Bay-Liberty Grove library commission received an anonymous donation to pay for landscaping and 10 years of maintenance of library grounds. Landscaping behind the building is something Phelan said has been a goal of the library commission for years.

“It’s a great big, open, ugly space, and it’s something we’ve wanted to do ever since the library was built,” Phelan said.

In June the commission began working with landscape architect John Meredith, of Lakeshores Landscaping and Design, to come up with a design.

“We’re trying to use it as a teaching tool as well,” Meredith said. “Their focus was an extension of the library, and not just another garden.”

The garden splits the space for a variety of uses for library visitors.

“It can be used by young and old as a place to read, as a place to meditate, as a place to go on their laptops,” Phelan said.

John Meredith of Lakeshores Landscaping and Design worked with the library committee to create a multi-faceted extension of the library space that also managed the stormwater runoff.

There will be a patio area near the building designated as a “technology zone” for library visitors who want to bring their laptops and use the Internet. But outside of that space, Meredith said he wanted the garden to have a more natural feel.

The design includes a children’s garden, which will have some patio space with a large checkerboard stained into the concrete and kid-sized furniture for outdoor kids programs.

A performance area will be built next to the library’s tool shed, with room for a crowd of 20 to 30 people to gather and watch a performance, listen to a book reading or participate in a discussion.

There will be a labyrinth created to help guide visitors looking for a meditative experience. Labyrinths are winding, circular paths that are used in many cultures as means of meditation, relaxation and prayer.

“When I think of reading it’s more of a passive pastime,” Meredith said. “When you look at coming into the labyrinth, it’s a lot of internal self-awareness, the whole meditation quality behind going through a labyrinth.”

The landscaping will also address a more functional need of the library – to manage stormwater. The library sits downhill of much of Sister Bay, so when it rains water that isn’t absorbed by the soil moves toward the building. The new design includes a rain garden to help absorb some of that moving water.

“It holds the water onsite and delays it, and either allows the plant material to take the water up or have it infiltrate into the soil before it spills into the stormwater system,” Meredith said.

The garden will be made with native plants and reflect the natural beauty of Door County. Meredith plans to put up limestone outcroppings like those seen along the sides of roads carved into hills. With more native plants and less grass, the garden will take less maintenance – which means fewer chemicals and fuel used to keep it looking good.

“We’re just trying to make it more of a natural environment,” Meredith said.