Happy Earth Day 2026

Our project photographer, Chad Ziemendorf, has been documenting the Library since the earliest days of construction. Ahead of Earth Day, we asked him to share what has stayed with him.
A few moments from his notes:

Watching the RES crew plant 400,000 native plugs across the property — seeds harvested by hand, cultivated through the winter, and returned to the soil one plug at a time.

A bumblebee landing on a rooftop flower last August. "It didn't know it was on a roof. It just found what it was looking for."

The building, seen from a distance, disappearing into the landscape. That was always the goal — and they pulled it off.

Chad has a newsletter of his own that goes deeper on the Native Plant Project. We will share a link in a future issue. For now, the short version is this: every person on this project has treated it as a privilege. You can see it in the work.