East Washington Street Branch Library wins Indiana Landmarks Preservation Award.

Not-for-profit historic preservation group Indiana Landmarks on Thursday presented several awards to recognize outstanding restoration projects in central Indiana.

The awards, presented in the Tobias Theater at the Indianapolis Museum of Art, were given in the following categories:

Outstanding Restoration Awards

— Indianapolis Public Library, for its rehabilitation of the East Washington Street Branch Library, built in 1910 at 2822 E. Washington St.

INDIANAPOLIS -- A little more than 108 years after Andrew Carnegie first donated the money for its construction, the historic East Washington Street Carnegie Library is reopening its doors this week in better shape than ever.

The building, located at 2822 E. Washington Street, is one of five Carnegie libraries built in Indianapolis in the early 20th Century. Three of them – the Spades Park Branch of the library, the former Hawthorne Branch, now a community center, and the building on East Washington Street – remain standing to this day.

The $2.4 million renovation was the first major work on the building since it opened in 1910. The renovation added a 2,200-square-feet expansion on the building's north side, a new 16-unit computer lab and a new children's program space.

The renovation also makes the library ADA-accessible, adding a new entrance and elevator for patrons with physical impediments or mothers with young children in strollers.

Although the library wants to tout the additions, it was also quick to point out the renovation kept many of the most iconic features of the original building intact – including two "book gnomes" that adorn the front entrance.

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