Since Wednesday, Oct. 21, the east side of the lobby at Oak Ridge Public Library has been home to a coffee bar. Bud's Library Café belongs to the same owner as Bud's Coffee Shop, a little way down Oak Ridge Turnpike. It opened with a 10 a.m. ribbon cutting attended by city officials, library staff and the Bud's team.
The café also keeps its own schedule, which is shorter than the library's. Coffee is available on weekdays and Saturday mornings. Evenings and Sundays are unchanged, and so far that covers nearly every holiday event on the Civic Center campus this year. If you plan your library visits around the café, you'll do most of them before mid-afternoon.
A Request the Library Kept Hearing
The café was a response to patrons asking for it. In the City of Oak Ridge announcement, Library Director Julie Forkner said the request went back years:
"The café responds to a long-standing request from Library patrons for convenient access to coffee, drinks, and snacks. The City's original request for qualifications for café services specifically identified refreshments as one of the Library's most requested amenities."
Clark Nexsen designed the space with input from Bud's owner Anne Holland. The renovation turned existing lobby space into a dedicated coffee bar with new casework, plumbing fixtures and equipment, flooring, paint and lighting. In the same release, Holland said the goal was to "bring Bud's Coffee Shop into the Library and create another welcoming place for people to connect."
The original Bud's has been at 1151 Oak Ridge Turnpike since 2021. Holland, a musician, founded it, and the city's description of the shop lists coffee and tea, breakfast sandwiches, bagels, pastries, homemade yogurt, granola and fruit spreads. The Oak Ridger's photo gallery from opening week identifies Holland as the owner of Bud's Farmhouse Coffee.
The library now asks visitors to buy refreshments from the café instead of bringing outside food and drinks into the building. If you usually carry a travel mug in for an afternoon of reading, that's a change.
Two Schedules Under One Roof
Here's the hours table the library posted for the last week of October, with the building, the café and the Oak Ridge Room archive side by side.
| Day | Library | Bud's Library Café | Oak Ridge Room |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sunday | 2–6 p.m. | Closed | Closed |
| Monday–Thursday | 10 a.m.–8 p.m. | 10 a.m.–4:30 p.m. | 10 a.m.–noon, 1–6 p.m. |
| Friday | 10 a.m.–6 p.m. | 10 a.m.–4:30 p.m. | 10 a.m.–noon |
| Saturday | 10 a.m.–6 p.m. | 10 a.m.–3 p.m. | Closed |
Adding up the week, the library is open 60 hours and the café 37.5. About three of every five hours you can spend in the building now come with coffee. The other hours fall in a few predictable places: weeknights from 4:30 to 8, the last three hours on Saturday, the end of Friday afternoon, and all four Sunday hours.
The Oak Ridge Room fits the café much more closely. The archive opens Monday through Thursday when the café does, breaks for lunch, and closes 90 minutes after the café. The library describes the archive as holding materials from Oak Ridge's earliest days and the Manhattan Project. So a weekday morning spent with a coffee and the archive works well under the new schedule.
The table reflects one posted week. Holiday weeks can change library hours, so check the library's live table before heading over Thanksgiving week.
Which November Programs Fall Inside the Café Window
The library's program calendar for November leans toward midday and Saturday afternoons, and most of those programs overlap the café's hours. Here's how this month's listings line up:
- "To the Moon and Beyond - Humanity's Next Great Adventure!" Friday, Nov. 6, noon to 1 p.m. The café is open the whole hour.
- 5th Annual Seed Swap. Saturday, Nov. 7, 1 to 5 p.m. The café closes at 3, so get there in the first two hours if you want a drink.
- "Know the Prose: Globetrotters." Thursday, Nov. 12, 4 to 5:30 p.m. The café closes half an hour after it starts.
- "Oak Ridge Uncovered: Early OR Housing and Notable Occupants." Wednesday, Nov. 18, noon to 1 p.m. The café is open, and the Oak Ridge Room reopens at 1 p.m. right after the talk.
- Sensory Story Group. Friday, Nov. 20, 10:30 to 11:30 a.m., fully inside café hours.
- Conservation Conversation. Saturday, Nov. 21, 1 to 2 p.m., finishing an hour before the café's Saturday close.
The two author events this season run online at 7 p.m.: Rebecca Roanhorse on Nov. 19 and Helen Scheuerer on Dec. 3. You watch those from home, so the lobby schedule doesn't come into it.
The Nov. 18 housing talk is the best match for the new setup. You can get coffee, hear the noon talk on early Oak Ridge housing, then take your questions to the archive when it reopens at 1 p.m.
Out the Door and Around Bissell Park
The library and A.K. Bissell Park share the 1401 Oak Ridge Turnpike address. With the café, a walk in the park can start with a cup from the lobby. The park has a paved 1.25-mile loop, a picnic shelter and a performance pavilion, according to Explore Oak Ridge. Next door at 1403 is the Oak Ridge Civic Center, with a gym, an indoor pool and an outdoor pavilion that hosts concerts.
The Secret City Commemorative Walk sits along the way and honors the city's Manhattan Project-era workers. It's an oval walk with 10 bronze plaques, eight bronze markers and four Founder Walls. The walk includes the International Friendship Bell, an 8,000-pound bronze bell that the visitor bureau says honors those workers and celebrates peace and friendship with sister city Naka Shi, Japan.
That makes a short weekday loop: coffee in the lobby, around the plaques to the bell, and back inside to the Oak Ridge Room for anything the plaques made you want to look up. All of it is within one address and within the café's hours.
December Mostly Happens After Closing Time
The holiday calendar runs on a different schedule from the café. The city calendar lists the Tree Lighting Ceremony at A.K. Bissell Park on Friday, Dec. 4, from 7 to 8 p.m. On a Friday under the posted hours, the café closes at 4:30 and the library at 6, so the busiest night of the year on the campus starts after both have closed.
The year's other big holiday events happen away from the lobby, and only their Saturday hours overlap the café's. The FARM Holiday Market sets up at Historic Jackson Square on Saturday, Nov. 28, from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Holiday Ice Skating runs at Oak Ridge Mall from Dec. 4 through Dec. 30. Regular hours are Wednesday through Friday 5 to 9 p.m., Saturday 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. and Sunday 1 to 9 p.m., with special hours Dec. 14–30 and a Christmas Day closure. Under those regular hours, Saturday is the only day the rink and the café are both open, from 11 a.m. until the café closes at 3.
On tree-lighting day, then, the café makes most sense earlier. A Friday afternoon visit with a library errand and coffee before 4:30 leaves time to head home and come back to Bissell Park for 7. On weekdays, the café is open 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday through Friday and 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday, just inside the doors at 1401 Oak Ridge Turnpike.
At Foster-Boline Group, we keep track of how Oak Ridge actually runs, from the hours on the library's lobby café to the evenings the park fills up. If you're thinking about where your weekly routine fits in Oak Ridge, or what your home here is worth right now, request a free home valuation or schedule a neighborhood consultation with us.
