Library Station to include St. Louis Bread restaurant

Much like its south-side counterpart, the Library Station will offer patrons more than books when it opens next summer.

The Library Station, 2535 E. Kansas Expwy., will include a St. Louis Bread Company restaurant.

"They came to us and said they wanted to go into the library," said Annie Busch, the library district's executive director. "We felt like it was the best match for us. We have similar clientele. There's nothing like it in that part of town, and we wanted a well-established, well-recognized name."

The restaurant will have its own entrance to the building. The food service and the contractor were chosen for the new library last month, R.E. Smith Construction Company.

Eleven companies bid on the project. Smith's bid was within $19,000 of the estimate.

The 36,000-square-foot building, the site of the former Heilig-Meyers Furniture store, was purchased for $1.35 million.

Part of the funds for the building and renovation costs came from Proposition L, a tax increase passed by voters in April. The remainder of the cost will be covered by the sale of the Kearney Branch location, which will be sold after the Library Station is opened.

Sapp Design Associates Architects PC has been chosen as the architect for the project. It also designed the Library Center. Jim Stufflebeam, senior project manager and designer, said the company has been working on plans for the Library Station for more than a year.

"We worked on concepts and came up with display boards before the election on Proposition L to give people an idea of what the new library would be like," he said. "When we started, we didn't even know what building the library was going to be in."

After the election, Stufflebeam and his coworkers began coming up with schematic designs.

"We reconfigured the area to make an open space where the St. Louis Bread Company will go," he said. "There were several existing rooms in the area where the restaurant will go, on the southeast corner of the building. The designs include adding more windows for the restaurant space, a small covered patio and a covered walkway to add the restaurant's facade and signage."

Stufflebeam said that getting the building ready for a restaurant to move in isn't going to be a major undertaking.

"We were redoing a lot of the electrical and piping system anyway," he said. "We'll just run new services to the tenant's space."

The thematic decor will be centered on the importance of transportation to Springfield and Greene County. Busch said the history includes Route 66.

Stufflebeam is working with Busch and the library staff on the furniture, finishes and color schemes, and with Jeanne Waters-Hill, owner of Touche' Designs Inc., on the special decorations, artwork and displays.

The decor is being paid for by a $200,000 donation from the C.W. Titus Foundation, founded by an Oklahoma oil company with family ties to Springfield. The Titus family underwrote the cost of the decor in the children's department at the Library Center and the Midtown Carnegie Branch.

The floor plan, which was finalized this fall, will incorporate the St. Louis Bread Company; a small gift shop; a drive-up window; 10 meeting rooms; an auto repair collection, which will be moved from the Library Center; a small genealogy collection; and the only consumer law collection in the system.

There will be laptops that people can check out to use throughout the building. There will be two self-checkout machines where patrons can scan their own cards and books.