This article is from our 2025 Fall District Discovery, see the full publication
When Kate hosted a party for her son Rory’s first birthday, she booked the Venue at Library 21c, a space with plenty of room to set up tables, a small ball pit, and a play area.
“The Venue at Library 21c is great for the kids, because it’s so big, and they like to run around,” she says. “It’s a lot more space than we have at home.”
Kate reserved the room for four hours, allowing two hours for the party, plus an hour prior for setup and an hour afterward for cleanup.
She knew many of the Libraries that are part of Pikes Peak Library District (PPLD) have event, meeting, and study rooms available for patrons to use at no cost. She attended a moms’ group that met in a smaller meeting space at East Library and also went with her son to Baby Time, an interactive program for families with babies from birth to 12 months, during which they experience language through songs, rhymes, and stories. Although East Library is closer to Kate’s home and has a large meeting space, she chose to book the spacious room at Library 21c for Rory’s birthday party.
PPLD has nearly 60 event spaces, meeting rooms, and study rooms in Libraries across the District that are available for public use by reservation. There is no cost to reserve and use a room, but you must be a library cardholder to make a reservation.
In 2024, more than 170,000 people took advantage of these Library facilities. Based on the median rental cost for comparable spaces in the area, the District estimates that these users saved about $1.2 million in rental fees.
The spaces are available for a wide variety of events and purposes, including personal milestones like birthday parties, baby showers, and celebrations; group get-togethers like Dungeons & Dragons sessions, craft clubs, and study sessions; and organizational events such as Scout meetings and presentations. They are also used by businesses to conduct client meetings, trainings, and other business events.
Carla, Pikes Peak Library District’s public relations & marketing manager, remembers attending meetings at East Library when she was a teenager preparing to take an international trip in 2005 hosted, chaperoned, and guided by the People to People Student Ambassador Program. For several months prior to their departure, the 30 or so students who would be traveling to England and France and their parents met several times a month with People to People representatives to learn about the countries, go over travel safety, and review the rules and procedures they would be expected to follow. At one meeting, she says, the students were assigned to research one of the cultural sites they would visit; hers was The Louvre. Meeting at the Library made it convenient for them to conduct research for the assignment. At the final meeting, the students were given information packets and passports for their three-week journey. And it all happened at the Library!
Carla participated in the program again the next summer on a trip to Japan and again attended preparatory meetings at East Library.
“I remember I was surprised to find out that you could just use the rooms at the Library,” she says. “I thought it was pretty cool that the Library had those spaces available.”
The Library’s large event spaces include the Venue at Library 21c (up to 350 people); the Community Room at East Library (up to 100 or 160 people); and the Columbine A and Columbine B rooms at Penrose Library (up to 92 or 184 people), all of which are ideal for sizeable gatherings and events. These large rooms can be reserved up to six months in advance. Due to their popularity, early reservations are recommended.
Also available at many Library locations are meeting rooms of various capacities that may have technology such as computers, projectors, or sound systems. Although Library staff does not operate equipment or provide technical support, patrons may schedule time to test audio-visual equipment ahead of their reservations. These rooms can be reserved up to three months in advance.
Study rooms, which do not have technical equipment, can accommodate one to five people, depending on the location, and can be reserved up to one week in advance. Reservations can be made for a maximum of two hours
per day. Study rooms played important roles in education for Library users Seraphim and her husband Ahrah (identified by pseudonyms for this story).
Seraphim used study rooms at East Library and Library 21c as a way to focus her mind and organize materials for concurrent enrollment classes. She also used study rooms later for personal writing. During his undergraduate studies, Ahrah used the study rooms about a dozen times for group projects and meetings. He also utilized the Library for research and as a quiet place to write papers.
Both Seraphim and Ahrah found it easy to make reservations for the rooms on the District’s website. Seraphim adds that she often was able to use one of the study rooms on a walk-in basis when nobody else was using them and there were no scheduled reservations.
Patrons who want to reserve a space should check with their preferred Library location for availability. Library-sponsored events also make use of the meeting rooms, so it is important to plan ahead. For example, the Venue at Library 21c is not available during large, District-wide programs like Mountain of Authors and All Pikes Peak Reads.
Library cardholders can read meeting room policies and then make a reservation request online at ppld.librarymarket.com/reserve-room.