Roanoke Renovation Open House

Program Type:

Animal Events, Arts & Crafts, Family Programming, Workshops

Age Group:

Youth (0 - 18), Babies (0 - 24 months), Toddlers (2 - 6), Children (7 - 11), Teens (12 - 18), Adults, Everyone
Please note you are looking at an event that has already happened.

Event Details

IPDPL - Roanoke FINALLY Gets the Party It Deserves!

In May 2019, Illinois Prairie District Public Library embarked on a renovation project at our Roanoke branch.  Like a particularly infamous 3-hour cruise, things did not go according to plan, and after nearly four years, IPDPL – Roanoke is finally getting the long-overdue renovation celebration it deserves.

You are cordially invited to a Renovation Open House at IPDPL – Roanoke during extended hours from 10:00 am to 2:00 pm.  Scheduled activities include:

  • 10:00 am - 11:00 am
    • Reading to Dogs with the therapy dogs from WOOF (We Offer Our Friends)
  • 10:00 am - 1:00 pm
    • Face painting
  • 10:00 am - 2:00 pm
    • Guided tours of the finished facilities
    • Balloons from The Unique Twist
    • Light refreshments from Caleri’s Café & Bakery
    • Coloring pages and play spaces for the kids

 

 

 

 

The Longest Five Months in History

The building at 123 E. Broad St., Roanoke was put up in the early 1950s.  It has had a long and storied past, serving initially as a hardware store, then a grocery store and a funeral home before the property was acquired by Illinois Prairie in September 2002.  A total renovation of the structure was planned for early 2019, with construction slated to begin in May of that year and a grand re-opening celebration scheduled for October 2019.  A series of delays, including the discovery of asbestos in the building, pushed the end date of the project to early February 2020, then to March.  Finish construction on the interior of the building was stopped entirely at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.  Piecemeal construction resumed a month later, but progress was slow due to health and safety restrictions on the crew.

The building was finally turned back over to the library in mid-May 2020, a year and two weeks after the initial closing date.  Library staff returned books and other materials to the shelves, but service to the public was restricted to curbside pick-up only for the next several months.  Even after interior browsing resumed, capacity restrictions prevented the district from being able to celebrate the renovations as had been previously imagined.  To see a short video documenting the renovations, please visit https://bit.ly/IPDPL-Roanoke-Reno.