Free Library of Philadelphia – Whitman Branch

This library has a great staff and many wonderful volunteers. They offer a lot of classes and activities for children and adults alike. This Whitman Branch offers group yoga, reading classes, and various tutorials for the community.

Great library with a lot of activities for children and adults. There are classes, yoga, and many other activities. So many volunteers that are so willing to teach kids.

Great library. Some libraries in Philly are the opposite of what you hope/​expect time experience at a library as in, they are loud, dirty and really just somewhere for random people to hang. The staff at this library does a good job keeping the space clean, organized and quiet. As the previous review stated, this place is activated and well used without feeling overcrowded. I have to add that the hours at this place are amazing. Open into the evening and on weekends! This was a huge down in my other neighborhood libraries in Philly. I never understand why a community location would be open only during regular working hours.
The only issues I have, bringing this to a four star, is the lack of selection. It is a smaller branch; however, the lack of selection does not result form the lack of space. There is pleny of shelf room on existing shelves. Seems like a systematic issue-​not sure what would make this library not so full. Especially empty is the magazine selection. I enjoy reading magazines but I don’t like having them. Sitting in a library browsing magazines is relaxing to me. However, this branch only as a few titles. I hope they ramp this up some time in the future. And perhaps another issues – the wifi is pretty slow. But, its workable.

This is a really good library, not that big but clean and organized. The staff if really friendly and they put different featured items out each week to expose some lesser known material. There’s always people in here but never seems too crowded. I can usually find whatever I am looking for pretty easy. Also with the Philadelphia library system it is easy to request an item from other branches. I like being able to go in get what I need leave within 5 minutes. Not so easy with some other libraries. This is a great one.