Buildings with Libraries - A Soft-Spoken Amenity - NYTimes.com Uli Seit for The New York Times BOOK CLUB Residents gather in the library of Toren condominium in downtown Brooklyn, one of a growing number of buildings with an in-house library. WHEN Martin Semjen first looked at the Stanton, a co-op at Broadway and 94th Street, he was delighted by the sauna and fitness room. His wife, Lynn Schnurnberger, on the other hand, fell hard for an unpretentious basement library that doubles as a meeting room and is lined on three sides with floor-to-ceiling wood bookcases. Residents can choose volumes on law and art, popular novels like "The Da Vinci Code" and "Atonement" and, fittingly enough, a biography of the building's namesake, Elizabeth Cady Stanton. "I really don't use the fabulous gym equipment, but I do go and look at the old books," said Ms. Schnurnberger, the co-author of, among other novels, the bestseller "Botox Diaries." The existence of the library spoke to the fact that this was more than a building. It was a community of people who still read. Granted, in New York residential buildings, barbells carry far more weight than books. "The gym is still one of the most important amenities, and after that are things like roof decks or other outdoor space," said Tami Shaoul, a senior vice president of the Corcoran Group. "No client has ever told me "I must have a library." But when we go somewhere and do a tour of the amenities, their eyes do light up if they actually see one," she added. It makes them feel good about the building because they imagine themselves having that quiet space. In the highly competitive New York marketplace, where developers of residential buildings seem to be engaged in an amenities arms race - cold storage, wine cellar, gym, pool, hot tub, children's playroom, "tween playroom, party room - the library is a low-cost frill. You don't need a lot of space to create a small reading room. It can be carved out of the lobby," said Kathy Braddock, an owner of Rutenberg Realty. And even though in this age of eBooks a library can seem like an anachronism, some of New York's glossiest and highest profile new developments boast of having one. The library "may be a marker of luxury. It's like having that fourth kid," said Roy Kim, a senior vice president of design at Extell, whose condo project One57 on West 57th Street, scheduled to open in late 2013, will have a library. So will the Touraine, an Upper East Side condo by Toll Brothers opening earlier that year. "It's an experiment on our end," said David von Spreckelsen, a division president of Toll Brothers. The demographic at the Touraine is a little older - some empty nesters or couples with a pied-à-terre. They're not people who are working 9 to 9. Weekends and nights, they'll come home and may have time to go to the library to read and have a glass of wine by the fire. We'll see how it goes. On the most practical level, a library in a New York building is the equivalent of a bonus room in a sprawling suburban house. At the Battery Park City condominium 1 Rector Park "the residences are not large," said James Lansill, a senior managing director of Corcoran Sunshine, the sales and marketing agents for the building. Consequently, its library, known as Bar and Books, can be a retreat "while the housekeeper is vacuuming, or to get away from the nanny and the children," he said. The lounge chairs and mohair sofas have helped turn the space into a second living room for some owners. As Ms. Braddock puts it, "a library increases the square footage of your own apartment because it gives an extra quiet place in the building you can get away to. That's a big deal in New York. Whether residents read the books on the shelves is irrelevant. About those books. The developer generally seeds the collection, but often it grows in an organic fashion as residents cull their own shelves. Such was the case at Manhattan House on East 66th Street, where coffee table tomes on design got the ball rolling. Similarly themed titles have made their way from personal collections to the rooftop library, a building spokesman said. At 1 Rector Park, volumes on art, architecture, travel and fashion were the first arrivals, Mr. Lansill said. "Now that people have moved in and regularly used the library," he said, "the collection has slowly grown. Residents are especially comfortable borrowing children's books and adding their own. Our most shared titles, without a doubt, come from the Harry Potter series.