"Modern libraries definitely aren't just a warehouse of books, and we've been exploring that through our Advanced Learning Library and all of our other branches. Libraries are meeting spaces. They're places for opportunities for discovery, connection."
That's Jaime Nix, Wichita's director of libraries, talking about the Westlink Branch the week it reopened. If you live in Westlink and haven't set foot inside the building at 8515 Bekemeyer since it closed for renovation back in 2023, you're picturing the wrong place. The library that shut its doors that spring and the one that reopened two years later share an address and not much else. And the part of the project that's actually unusual isn't the square footage. It's what the city built in the side yard.
What Actually Doubled
Westlink's branch was, before the closure, the busiest in the entire Wichita Public Library system, packed into 10,340 square feet that hadn't seen a real update since a minor 2010 refresh added self-check stations and doubled the computer count. The Wichita City Council voted in 2022 to fund something bigger. The branch closed in May 2023 and moved into a much smaller temporary space at the Crossroads Shopping Center on Central, and the council approved Key Construction as general contractor that November. Mayor Brandon Whipple and District 5 Councilmember Bryan Frye were on hand when the project broke ground the following January.
The finished project, according to Key Construction's own project record, remodeled 11,000 square feet and added another 8,000, pushing the branch to nearly double its original footprint. The doors opened to the public on March 24, 2025, after what KSN described as an almost two-year remodel, and the city held a full ribbon-cutting and grand reopening celebration on May 10, 2025, complete with a children's musician and a beginner sewing class.
That's the part of the story most residents already half know, even if they've never read a headline about it. What's newer information, and the reason this is worth a longer look, is what's happening on the south side of the building.
The Backyard No One Explains
Walk or drive past the Westlink branch today and you'll see a fenced outdoor area attached to the children's room that doesn't look like a playground. There's no slide, no swing set, nothing molded out of plastic. That's intentional. The city built it around something called Anji Play, an early childhood approach the library describes as "transformative," built on five stated principles: love, risk, joy, engagement, and reflection. The library calls the underlying philosophy "True Play," a style of learning that hands children simple, natural materials and steps back, trusting them to explore and problem-solve without an adult directing the activity.
It's a genuinely uncommon thing to find behind a public library in Kansas. Most renovated branches add study rooms and better wifi. Westlink added a pedagogical philosophy with a name and a history, translated into loose parts and open space for kids ages three to five to use however they want. The library has run come-and-go Anji Play sessions since the branch reopened, framed simply as time for a child to find the joy in unstructured play with the materials provided.
If you've driven past that fence a dozen times without knowing what it was for, you're not missing an amenity. You're missing an idea the city imported specifically for this neighborhood's kids.
What the Calendar Actually Looks Like, More Than a Year Later
A ribbon-cutting is easy news. What's harder to fake is a full calendar more than a year after the excitement wore off. Here's a sample of what's been scheduled at Westlink through 2026, well past any opening-week bump:
- Crochet Corner, a come-and-go session held in the branch's low-tech Maker Space, where staff teach chains and single crochet to anyone 13 and older who wants to learn, supplies provided.
- Home Canning, led by Sara Sawer of K-State Extension in Sedgwick County, walking residents through what it actually takes to preserve garden produce for winter.
- Family Fun with the Wichita Symphony, a sensory-friendly, interactive concert built for families with kids ages 4 to 8.
- Teen Art & Archaeology, where teens dig into the history of art through archaeology and make their own piece.
- Family: Wild Robot Adventure, activities for kids 6 to 11 built around the book "Wild Robot" by Peter Brown.
- Preschool Storytime, the kind of steady weekly program that doesn't make news but fills a room every time.
That's a canning class, a symphony visit, a craft night, and a kids' book program, spread across the first seven months of 2026 rather than clustered around a reopening date more than a year in the past. None of it requires a library card fee or a drive to the other side of town. It requires walking into a building most Westlink residents already pass on the way to Dillons or the Ace Hardware at the shopping center.
A Different Kind of Anchor
Central and Tyler has always been Westlink's commercial center, the strip mall from 1958 that gave the neighborhood its name and its grocery runs. That corridor still does what it's always done: errands, quick meals, the Westlake hardware run. What's changed is that a mile or so away, the library has started doing something the shopping center never did, giving residents a reason to plan an evening around a place rather than just stop there on the way to somewhere else. A canning class on a Tuesday night. A symphony performance on a Wednesday afternoon. A crochet lesson that doesn't require buying anything.
It's a quieter kind of neighborhood infrastructure, the sort that doesn't show up in a real estate listing or a drive-by impression, but it's the sort of thing that makes a place feel lived in rather than just passed through.
If You Haven't Been Back
The branch's hours are steady, Monday through Thursday 10 a.m. to 8 p.m., Friday and Saturday 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., and Sunday 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. The Maker Space's sewing machine requires a library card and a scheduled orientation appointment, which the Advanced Learning Library can set up over the phone. Everything else, from the Anji Play sessions to the crochet corner, is walk-in.
If it's been a while since you've been inside the Westlink branch, or if you've only ever seen it from the parking lot, it might be worth a stop. Not because the neighborhood needs another reason to feel proud of itself. Because the building actually changed, and most of what changed isn't visible from Bekemeyer Street.
Nancy Jo Statton has spent 37 years watching Westlink grow, change, and occasionally surprise even longtime residents, and she'd love to talk with you about what's happening in the neighborhood, whether or not real estate is on your mind. Visit Nancy Jo Statton or Let's Connect anytime.
