Lou Duggan Creative Studio Grand Opening

On January 18, 2020, community members; along with the family, friends, former students and colleagues of Lou Duggan; gathered on the 2nd Floor of Central Library, opens a new window to honour Lou and celebrate the official opening of his legacy gift to Halifax: The Lou Duggan Creative Studio.

Halifax Public Libraries was honoured to work with Lou and his family to bring this vision to life in the form of a collaborative, multifunctional makerspace in the heart of Central Library.

Through upgrades and additions over the past year, The Lou Duggan Creative Studio has transformed into a colourful, vibrant space, buzzing with possibility. Through Lou's gift, top-of-the-line technology, cooking, and crafting equipment call the Studio home. The Studio is open to all ages and plays host a variety of hands-on workshops and programs throughout the week.

Lou was committed to education, mentorship, and creating learning opportunities for students studying to become librarians. Part of Lou’s gift was dedicated to creating two internships focused on building experience in public STEM programming for children, teens, and adults. At the grand opening event, we were pleased to introduce Jenn and Cohen, the first interns to fill these roles at the Lou Duggan Creative Studio.

Akemi, a friend of the Library who moved to Canada from Japan, spoke at the opening ceremony, sharing the impact the Lou Duggan Creative Studio has had on her life. It has empowered her to build friendships in her new city and share recipes from home. 

"Lou wanted to construct libraries and their administration in a different way than things had been done before...," said Ruth Duggan, Lou's sister. "He really wanted to take new technologies, and how we learn and what we learn, and combine that with some of the traditional ways of learning.” 

The Grand Opening weekend would have marked Lou's 53rd birthday. The memories shared, the smiles on faces, and the new creations of the day (pancake robots, bookmarks, 3D-printed keychains, and more) paid tribute to Lou's spirit and vision—and gave us a glimpse of the many moments and stories that will come out of this space.