{"id":402982,"date":"2026-09-17T23:15:00","date_gmt":"2026-09-17T23:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/402982\/"},"modified":"2026-09-17T23:15:00","modified_gmt":"2026-09-17T23:15:00","slug":"obama-main-library-earns-national-design-recognition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/402982\/","title":{"rendered":"Obama Main Library earns national design recognition"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>September 17, 2026 &#8211; St. Petersburg\u2019s President Barack Obama Main Library is one of 15 projects selected for <a href=\"https:\/\/americanlibrariesmagazine.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">American Libraries<\/a> magazine\u2019s 2026 Library Design Showcase, which recognizes new and renovated libraries across the U.S. and Canada. The city\u2019s 43,200-square-foot main library recently underwent a $4.8 million renovation designed by HBM Architects, adding redesigned community spaces, a tech loft, an auditorium and ocean-inspired artwork, including a large-scale wood installation by artist Benjamin Butler connecting the waters of Obama\u2019s Hawaiian childhood with Tampa Bay. The annual showcase, produced by the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ala.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">American Library Association<\/a>, is now in its 38th year.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/stpetecatalyst.com\/zaps\" class=\"btn btn-aqua\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">More Zaps<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/stpetecatalyst.com\" class=\"btn btn-aqua\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Frontpage<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"September 17, 2026 &#8211; St. Petersburg\u2019s President Barack Obama Main Library is one of 15 projects selected for&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":402983,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[202,204,203,199,201,200],"class_list":["post-402982","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-st-petersburg","tag-st-pete","tag-st-pete-headlines","tag-st-pete-news","tag-st-petersburg","tag-st-petersburg-headlines","tag-st-petersburg-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/402982","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=402982"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/402982\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/402983"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=402982"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=402982"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=402982"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}