Fleet Library at Rhode Island School of Design (RISD)

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Fleet Library at Rhode Island School of Design (RISD)

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A place for inquiry, inspiration, and research. View our current hours at https://risd.libcal.com/hours

Founded in 1878, the RISD Library is one of the oldest independent art college libraries in the country. Its more than 145,000 volumes and 380 periodical subscriptions offer unusual depth and richness in the areas of architecture, art, design and photography. The collection provides strong historical and contemporary perspectives, and materials in landscape architecture, ceramics, textiles, and jewelry support upper-level research. The library is also noted for its artist’s book collection, its rare books and outstanding visual resources collections.

10/27/2026

Have you stopped by to check out our current first floor exhibit? Star Dot Star: Over 125 Years of Glyph-Based Art in Print is on view through December 14, 2026!

From grid-based needlepoint and typewriter art to ASCII art and concrete poetry, this exhibit explores the ways in which humans love making images from text. Featuring materials from Fleet Library’s Special Collections and from the organizer’s personal collection.

10/09/2026

We are thrilled to present our new second floor exhibit: Wendy Hollender: Behind the Scenes of The Album of Plant Families Book. Highlighting the process of Wendy’s publication, a spectacular poster-sized book that illustrates the family connections between the plants around us, deepening our appreciation of nature.

In celebration of the opening of the exhibit, we invite you to a conversation this evening at the library! Scientific Illustration - Artists in Conversation will feature Wendy Hollender, Jean Blackburn and Nellie Geraghty-Scharf moderated by Curator of Collections, Claudia Covert! Join us in the Library Living Room at 6:30PM.

Wendy Hollender: Behind the Scenes of The Album of Plant Families Book
Fleet Library at RISD, 2nd Floor
October 2 - December 21, 2026

Scientific Illustration - Artists in Conversation
Friday, October 9 at 6:30pm

Portrait of Wendy by by Todd Spire for Edible Hudson Valley

09/21/2026

Join us this Thursday at 4PM on Zoom for an artist talk with Hugo Nakashima-Brown to discuss his current exhibit on the second floor of the library, Rooted in Color: Expanding the Color Palette of Regional Marquetry.

This exhibit showcases work created in Nakashima-Brown’s fellowship with the Color Lab. He sought to explore what a contemporary regionalist color palette might look like in woodworking and marquetry. While dyed veneers and imported species have largely freed contemporary makers from the color limitations that historically shaped furniture traditions, this project instead adopted a deliberate constraint: to work only with wood and wood-derived materials sourced locally, particularly those overlooked, discarded, or considered unsuitable for lumber.

Each work in the exhibit collides disparate cultural references: invasive New England species signify the ailments and addictiveness of smoking; Ming-dynasty joinery meets the forms of Chinese takeout packaging; a seventeenth-century Chinese table type is reimagined through the silhouette of a b**r bottle.

We hope to see you there! For more information, visit the link in our bio! 🔗

09/17/2026

Join us this evening in the Library Living Room for a panel discussion celebrating our current first floor exhibit: Star Dot Star: 125 Years of Glyph-based Art in Print.

The reception will include a panel discussion at 7:00 PM with guestsBen Sisto (OPEN), Kevin Driscoll (UVA), Gabriel Drozdov, Gabriel Drozdov (RISD), and Dan Wood DWRI Letterpress (RISD).

08/24/2026

Library spa day! 🛀📚 If you have visited Fleet Library in the last month, you may have noticed a bit of a makeover underway. Don’t fret! The library is in great hands with plaster molding and wall repairs by the experienced team from E.F. O’Donnell & Sons. Thank you so much to the E.F. O’Donnell & Sons team for your work on the Fleet Library and ensuring our historical building stays beautiful, safe and healthy just in time for Fall semester! ♥️ See you soon Rhode Island School of Design!

06/02/2026

We had so much fun hosting alumni for our Milestone Tea and Tour in RISD Archives with last week! The Milestone tea is dedicated to anyone celebrating a 45th reunion and beyond. We looked at yearbooks, RISD sports and cabaret ephemera, photo collections and more. Thank you all who stopped by and reminisced with us.

05/29/2026

Fleet Library is so excited for Commencement and Reunion Weekend and have been preparing by listening to the 2021 rizdeology interview with RISD 1997 Painting MFA alum Julie Mehretu, who will be receiving an honorary degree and giving the Commencement address, and her classmate Ben Edwards. You’ll find this and other rizdeology podcast interviews on Digital Commons @ RISD. Visit the link in our bio to listen! ⭐️

05/28/2026

We are thrilled to present the second iteration of RISD Revisited: Stories, Art, and Alumni, on view now on the first floor of the library! Curated by Term Archivist, Zoe Johnson in collaboration with Sarah Reed from RISD Alumni & Family Relations, the RISD Archives presents a special reunion-themed exhibit showcasing photographs of student life, campus events, design diplomas, and commencement, as well as student newspapers, works by alumni, memorabilia, and more throughout RISD history.

05/13/2026

Changes and Temporalities in Violin- and Guitar-Making Through the Collection of the Musée de la Musique of Paris.”

Jean-Philippe Échard, Curator of String Instruments
May 21, 7pm, Fleet Library
Free Event

Sponsored by the Division of Experimental and Foundation Studies, the Division of Liberal Arts, and Fleet Library.

This talk will explore what it means to experiment with musical instruments, a process shaped by the history of techniques, artisanal practices, the evolution of design, and changing cultural needs. Dr. Échard’s visit to Providence coincides with his participation in Musical Bodies, a new exhibition opening at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art on June 7 (https://www.metmuseum.org/exhibitions/musical-bodies)

Address

15 Westminster Street
Providence, RI
02903

Website

http://library.risd.edu/

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