{"id":42894,"date":"2023-03-16T06:01:00","date_gmt":"2023-03-16T10:01:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thelandmark.com\/?p=42894"},"modified":"2023-03-16T06:01:00","modified_gmt":"2023-03-16T10:01:00","slug":"characters-hang-their-coats-at-rutland-library","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/2023\/03\/16\/characters-hang-their-coats-at-rutland-library\/","title":{"rendered":"Characters hang their coats at Rutland library"},"content":{"rendered":"
By Ken Cleveland <\/b>
\n Landmark correspondent<\/i><\/div>\n

RUTLAND \u2014 As if designating by design, the hooks are ready for coats.<\/p>\n

Young patrons at the Rutland Free Public Library now have a colorful,<\/p>\n

artful coat area, where a Rutland artist turned simple coat hooks into art with a splash of color.<\/p>\n

\u201cAislinn initially asked if I would be interested in coming up with something that would cover up the hardware from having the coat racks reinstalled,\u201d Alison Stevenson said.<\/p>\n

Aislinn is Aislinn Lewis, the youth services librarian.<\/p>\n

\u201cI started with ideas of something simple and cute (such as ladybugs or flowers), but I had a few weeks before I was going to be back in town so I had a bit of time to think about what would be appropriate for the space, and the idea really grew. I kept thinking about the coat rack and what made sense to go on it.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat was my starting point, and then, because it\u2019s in the children\u2019s section of the library, I started to think about the different coats and items storybook characters might hang up if they were to visit the library themselves,\u201d Stevenson said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI also really liked the idea that the mural can be a game for patrons to play where they try to figure out which storybook character each item belongs to,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was just thrilled that Aislinn and Kerry (Remington, library director) and the other library staff were immediately on board and supportive, because the mural that I pitched to them was a much bigger project than what they\u2019d actually asked me to do.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey really let me run with my ideas, and it was so much fun to paint and get suggestions from my own kids and others about what characters to include,\u201d Stevenson said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI focused on the classics, and love that we have so many references (15) in such a small space,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Spoiler alert: If you intend to quiz yourself, skip this. The characters referenced are, from left to right: Cat in the Hat; Winnie the Pooh; Harry Potter; Angelina Ballerina; Puss in Boots; Paddington Bear; Blueberries for Sal; Max from Where the Wild Things Are; Cinderella; The Very Hungry Caterpillar; Pete the Cat; Harold and the Purple Crayon; Courderoy; Clifford the Big Red Dog; and Little Red Riding Hood.<\/p>\n

Lewis said that \u201cthe mural came about quite by accident. We had to reinstall the coat rack, and after, it needed to be repainted. It seemed like a good opportunity to paint it something adorable, like a lady bug pattern, or rain drops, rather than trying to match the existing beige paint.<\/p>\n

\u201cI reached out to an artist who lives in town and asked if she wanted to do it, since she is far more skilled than I am with a paintbrush. Her response was an immediate, \u2018absolutely!\u2019 She came in a week later and asked if she could paint on the wall behind the coat rack because she had an idea,\u201d Lewis said of Stevenson\u2019s plans.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe showed me her sketch of an amazing concept of famous children\u2019s book characters, who had hung their clothes on the coat rack. It was so charming. We had to go with it. If you look around the children\u2019s room, we actually have several local artists represented.<\/p>\n

\u201cMary Calkins, a part-time library employee, did an amazing mural when the library was closed during the pandemic. Artist Jen Niles did a series of decorative panels of cats and dogs reading several years ago, and a town Girl Scout troop painted the puppet theater and did a huge mural in the storytime room as part of their service mission,\u201d Lewis said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s really nice to watch the Children\u2019s Room constantly grow and evolve and become even more beautiful with all this amazing artwork.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe patrons actually did get to see the coat rack mural in progress. She painted it over several days when the library was open. It was so exciting for all of us,\u201d Lewis said.<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery time she came in, another layer was added. First was the pencil outline, then some primer, and several coats of finish paint. In all, 15 different children\u2019s book characters are represented. It adds such joy to the space. And we love watching families identify the characters and books represented, and talk about the ones that they have read,\u201d Lewis said.<\/p>\n

Stevenson liked painting with an audience.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was very smooth and really fun to get to paint while patrons were coming in and out of the area. Everyone was amazingly respectful of the wet paint and tapedoff area, especially considering that it was all coming to life at eye level for young patrons,\u201d Stevenson said.<\/p>\n

\u201cKids would sometimes come over and talk with me while I was working,, which was very nice of them, and I was happy to show them what I was doing. Some couldn\u2019t believe that I was getting to draw and paint on the walls, and others had fun guessing what I was making.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m also very grateful to my two boys for spending so many summer days in the library as well. They both love books and reading, but the mural took about five days to complete spaced out over a couple of weeks time in August, so I was glad that they were such good sports about it as well,\u201d Stevenson said.<\/p>\n

Library patrons, including some of Stevenson\u2019s own students, appreciated the artwork.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt makes me so happy to have been able to make something that I can share with the community. I work across the street at Naquag Elementary, which recently took a field trip to the library for the Smithsonian Exhibit, so I\u2019ve had students make the connection that I was the mural artist and they\u2019ve been so sweet telling me how much they like it.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re regular library patrons as well, so I love seeing that area being used and having kids notice the mural and figure out which characters are being referenced,\u201d Stevenson said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

RUTLAND \u2014 As if designating by design, the hooks are ready for coats. Young patrons at the Rutland Free Public Library now have a colorful, artful coat area, where a Rutland artist turned simple coat hooks into art with a splash of color.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":42897,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_gspb_post_css":"","_sitemap_exclude":false,"_sitemap_priority":"","_sitemap_frequency":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-42894","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"blocksy_meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42894","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42894"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42894\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/42897"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42894"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42894"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42894"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}