The South Whittier Public Library is located in South Whittier, California. The original public library, which opened in October 1988, had become too small for the growing community, so the county dedicated funds for a replacement facility over twice the size of the original in 2017.

The County of Los Angeles Public Library is committed to energy-efficient spaces and environments, so the design team prioritised the incorporation of natural light, as it aimed for the highest level of LEED Certification. “South Whittier Public Library is targeting LEED Platinum, so daylighting and daylight harvesting was a major part of the design strategy and Solatube played a critical role in that,” said Erik Mar, principal at Emar Studio.

The project used 64 daylighting units in total — a combination of Solatube 160 DS, 290 DS, 750 DS-O, 750 DS-C Daylighting Systems and wall-mounted diffusers.

“As you can see from the photos, Solatube Daylighting Systems are a beautiful and very opportune way to allow natural light into the building,” said Vache Keledjian, Capital Project Manager for LA County Libraries. “They help us save energy and in the long-run, more people feel comfortable when they get natural light coming in as opposed to artificial light. It’s a win-win situation and we are very proud and fortunate to be using the Solatube daylighting systems here.”

“To utilise fresh, natural light just opens everything up,” said Don Knabe, former LA County Supervisor. “It’s fresh, it’s alive, it makes you feel good, it’s clean and it’s beautiful.”

With daylighting incorporated throughout the library, minimal electric lighting is needed during the day. The project received LEED Platinum certification.

Green Dinosaur Inc, the Consulting Firm says the energy-efficient design, “reduced building lighting electricity consumption by 38% through use of Solatubes, daylighting strategies and daylighting controls.” 

Click here for a video on the project