The Estelle and Melvin Gelman Library

very nice. 7 floors and plenty of individual study spaces.

While most of the reading material here reeks of academia, you can find the works of Chambers, Kafka, and Lovecraft at Gelman.
Also, if you are Marty (or someone like Marty), you can find girls (possibly current prosts) that look like Beth here. Well, perhaps you can find more of those at the neighboring Starbucks, but that ain’t my thing and that ain’t my interest. Unless, of course, they have pills that can help me sleep. I’m always interested in that.

The location and hours can’t be beat, since it’s the only university library that’s practically in downtown DC and boasts 24-​hour coffee downstairs. The collection’s pretty extensive; I’d say that of the book searches I’ve done, they have about 70% of what I’ve needed.
The reading rooms can get overcrowded during the school year, and often with students who are working in groups or goofing off. There’s a fine line between having a pleasant background buzz and getting distracted by the conversation two tables over, and the latter is too often the case here. The quiet study rooms have widely disregarded «no laptop» signs and few power outlets. That said, crowding should improve once construction is complete.
You will need a university ID card to enter; most large universities nationally are members of ARL, and most local universities are members of CIRLA or WRLC. Accessing any of the computers, even for a catalog search, requires signing up at the circulation desk for a temporary network ID (the Starbucks wi-​fi works fine in its vicinity), and non-​GW users have to leave at midnight.

First time here as a Grad student.
Looks great inside and out. They just doubled the amount of computers here. They have a snack room where you can eat your meals and then go off to the reading and web surfing. Lots of floors.
They have group study rooms that you can reserve to study in (2 people min.) Printing is 7 cents per page for black and white.
The lighting is great and it generally very quiet and provides you with a great place to study.
Oh yea, open 24 hours and 7 days a week during the semester! (except for major holidays!)

Fluorescent lighting, broken or faulty heating resulting in sweat. This is the perfect place to die

Gelman is GREAT (although admittedly gallimaufry) Why you ask:
— Awesome special collections (including National Security Archives)
— 7 full floors of labs and educational resources
— Amazing hours
— Proximity to 24 Hour Starbucks (aka Collegiate Crack)
— Eclectic group of patrons ranging from studious, to stinky, to hilariously sleep deprived. (It makes for interesting people watching and breaks up the monotony when you’ve been staring at a text book for hours on end)
Gelman restrooms are (OH and this description also applies to the ever-​present chain smokers that sit right outside the doors creating a toxic cloud outside otherwise decent areas) :
— Gross
— Graveolent
— Glutinous
— Gut-​wrenching
— GAG-​tastic
…you get the point.

I am more than surprised to read the five-​star reviews about Gelman here. Maybe I’m just too jaded after attending GW for four years and going through all the misery that was staying at Gelman for way too many hours frantically trying to finish a project, write a paper, or print out homework right before class. As a library Gelman is nice, but for its principal customer base, GW students, it’s a bit shady, overcrowded at times, and depressing, especially during midterms and finals. Perhaps outside patron have yet to experience the stench from hundreds of leftover Starbucks cups piling up and sometimes overflowing from trash cans on the upper floors late at night (during peak seasons — midterms and finals), roaches around the bathrooms (very rare, but it has happened), students making out in bathroom stalls (I have thankfully not personally encountered that, but other people have), and above all, the crowds that flock to study rooms and lounges and make it extremely unpleasant to be in Gelman during those periods (some students literally live and sleep there, eating food from the library’s neighbor Starbucks and showering in the university gym that’s two blocks away; some student groups also collectively squad the study rooms, rotating members to occupy them 24 hours a day since one individual can only book a room for up to two hours). The craziness can be overwhelming, and that’s when Gelman ceases to be lovely. Many students prefer Eckles library, the GW library on another, smaller, campus on Foxhall Road. There’s free shuttle service departing from 23^rd and H Streets (one block away from Gelman) to Mount Vernon Campus where Eckles is located. During midterms and finals, Eckles has free coffee, tea, hot chocolate, and snacks. It’s also a lot more pleasant, much less crowded, cleaner, and probably more conducive to studying without all the insanity going on in Gelman at the same time. Books checked out from either library can be returned to either. As a side note for Gelman, it is not open 24 hours a day during summer. This summer it’s open 7:30am-midnight, and I doubt it will operate ²⁴⁄₇ any summer to come.

This library is SUPER-​convenient. It is almost always open 24 hours (even during the summer) and they DO allow food (unlike the University of Maryland libraries). It is two blocks from the Foggy-​Bottom station and has an attached starbucks. There is a copy card ATM available for patrons who are not GWU students to print/​make copies. I’m able to use this library, as GWU is part of a consortium that UMD belongs to.

I really like the Foggy Bottom library in comparison the the rest I frequent in the DC system. I really like the late night hours until 9pm on Mondays and Wednesdays. I used to live closer, now closer to MLK, but I still find myself at this location quite a bit. Decent DVD selection and it seems like the fiction collection leans to more of the recent award winners and a somewhat headier/​intellectual collection than other locations but that might be just an anomaly to my personal tastes however.

I heart Gelman.
The interior and exterior need a facelift, but other than that, I can’t say anything bad about this library.

I love the location of this library. I’m also very receptive to GWU’s campus in general, even though people make fun of it. This library reminds me a bit of the one at my undergrad alma mater, which was a wonderful place where I spent many hours (I’m a dork).
Grad school at GW isn’t bad either though, since the Gelman enables me to spend hours switching between surfing the Internet, wandering the stacks, and doing actual homework. The library’s café is super and so is it’s people watching.

I’m not a GW student, but since I went to Georgetown I can get into Gelman with my «GO-​card” – I just flash it and they wave me through (there is some sort of «consortium» between the local schools that opens library doors to all their students).
Anyway, I like this library better than Georgetown’s Lauinger – there are more internet computers (and you don’t have to sign in), there is a nicer café attached on the first floor, and the location is perfect now that i’m living around Dupont. Sit on the north side of the fourth or fifth floor to get a nice view of H street and plenty of peace and quiet to read and write.