The Living Library- It's ALIVE!

The Living Library is an initiative started in March 2022 which promotes horticultural education and entertainment through a variety of services. The unique botanical collection is composed of multiple sections including:1. A Garden Bibliotheque: The Garden Bibliothèque is a specialized collection of books dedicated to providing patrons with horticultural information on a wide variety of topics. Patrons can select titles on General Gardening, Farm-to-table Cuisine, Plant Crafting, Floral Arranging, Landscape and Botanical Design.2. Annual Seed Catalog: The Seed Catalog is an assortment of seeds organized to assist gardeners with their spring harvest planning. Categorized in fruits, vegetables, herbs, and flowers, users will find a wide assortment of plants which are appropriate for growing in the New England area. 3. Gardening Information: Our Gardening Information section provides you with an array of helpful information to support your green thumb efforts such as growing zone maps, perennials vs annual plants, deer resistant varieties, bulb planting, and more.4. "Garden of Things": This section contains items which may be checked out by patrons similar to the process of a "Library of Things". Examples include garden kits filled with garden tools, containers, gloves, seedling spray bottles, soil testers and kneeling pads. The Living Library was designed in progression of a virtual gardening program named "Bloom Zoom" which was sought to connect the patron community through online gardening tours and horticultural how-to chat sessions. The development of this service has led to an increase of health and wellness benefits, increased nutrition awareness, sociability and connectivity within the community. The Living Library also provided the organization with desirable in-person gardening programming and collection material which assisted the return of pre-pandemic patron attendance numbers. The result is the cultivation of a following interested in developing "green thumbs" and learning more about botanical crafts, techniques and projects. An objective of this presentation will be to discuss the design of the Living Library to allow other public libraries the opportunity to create their own individual garden-inspired services. The presentation will also offer the benefits of Living Libraries to their communities served, basic trouble shooting, programming menus and how to get started building individualized botanical collections.