From the beginning, we knew we wanted to incorporate dandelions into the design. At first contained to a corner of the overall sketch, they have since spread out and become the centerpiece of the narrative, taking us from one wall face to another all the way to the library’s entrance. There’s the obvious callback to Ray Bradbury’s Dandelion Wine, set in Green Town, a fictionalized version of Waukegan. In the book dandelions are a symbol of summer, youth, nostalgia, magic, and the beauty of life itself. In our reality dandelions have come to garner a bad reputation, seen as common weeds that overtake the spaces they find themselves in. It’s difficult to ignore the contradiction that exists between the dandelion’s reputation and the significance of its place not only in nature, but for those who’ve run around a field picking dandelions in our youth, in awe of a flower that reflects the stages of our own lives and our potential for growth and change. Despite its reputation, we can’t deny the simple joy one feels when making a wish on the fluffiest dandelion one can find. In that very act itself, we acknowledge the magic of a dandelion and allow ourselves to dream, or at the very least, play.
