haston bookmark

The Haston Free Public Library is in North Brookfield, Massachusetts. The original building was designed by Fuller and Delano, Architects, and completed in 1894, by Norcross Brothers, for a cost of $34,000. The cost for construction was donated by Erasmus and Elvira Haston, of North Brookfield. My office just completed the building’s first major renovation and addition, last year.

Fuller & Delano, Architects, of Worcester, Massachusetts, was a partnership between James E. Fuller, and Ward P. Delano, begun in 1878. Fuller & Delano designed many of the notable buildings in Worcester, including the Young Men’s Christian Associating building, the Armory and the Old South Church.

Norcross Brothers Contractors and Builders, founded by the brothers James and Orlando Norcross, was a very well know construction company, responsible for many famous buildings, and well known for their stonework. After the Norcross Brothers moved to Worcester in 1868, they soon met and formed a working relationship with the famous Victorian architect, H.H. Richardson. Norcross Brothers’ work with H.H. Richardson alone included, Trinity Church in Boston, the Marshall Field & Co. store in Chicago and Sever Hall at Harvard University, and roughly 30 other projects.

Fuller & Delano’s design for the Haston Free Public Library is Richardsonian Romanesque in design, borrowing heavily from H.H. Richardson’s style, and executed in pale gray granite, with a red slate roof, and copper cornice and accents. The interior is warm and rich, paneled in fumed oak, with stained glass windows, marble mosaic flooring in the foyer and a museum on the second floor.