The Arboretum is now home to Little Free Library for books, health-related resources
LEXINGTON, Ky. (Sept. 25, 2026) — Visitors to The Arboretum, State Botanical Garden of Kentucky, enjoy Kentucky landscapes, attend engaging programming and learn more about the environment. Now, they can also take or leave a book from the Little Free Library.
A collaboration among University of Kentucky organizations and colleges, including the Martin-Gatton College of Agriculture, Food and Environment and the College of Health Sciences, the library is publicly accessible, with donated books that are free for anyone to take.
From class assignment to public resource
This project began when human health sciences student Katie Neglia, who hopes to attend medical school, wrote a class paper about how to improve health literacy in creative ways, including through the installation of a Little Free Library to stock free health resources for the public.
A busy student, Neglia could have turned in the paper for her social determinants of health course and moved on. Instead, with encouragement from her professor, Brendan O’Farrell, Ph.D., she decided to try to make the library a reality.
“My course encourages students to think beyond doctors, hospitals and pills when considering health and health outcomes. From education and socioeconomic status to transportation and community context, this leaves us with a lot to ponder,” said O’Farrell, assistant professor in the Department of Health and Clinical Sciences. “It is always inspiring to work with students like Katie, who bring their own passion to the course content and extend it beyond the classroom.”
Because Neglia was involved with research, she brought her idea to Haven Patrick, programming and marketing specialist at the Office of Undergraduate Research. The Arboretum, where Neglia has volunteered with children’s programming, seemed like “the perfect spot.”
Neglia brought the proposal to Hannah Wells, education coordinator and director of the Kentucky Children’s Garden, then to Michael Wall when he started as director of The Arboretum in June.
The team decided on the location for the Little Free Library: across from the entrance to the Kentucky Children’s Garden, beside the logs that are a popular destination at The Arboretum.
“This is where kids are,” Wall said, making it a prime location for families to use the library.
Plus, Wall added, it's not difficult for the Arboretum team to landscape at that location. The continued maintenance of the library has been an important consideration for the team, which is why Neglia created The Shared Shelf, now a campus organization, to ensure the library is sustainable beyond her graduation.
"Our core mission is to educate, inspire and enrich the lives of our community,” Wall said. “Integrating health literacy and accessible reading right outside the Kentucky Children’s Garden extends our educational impact beyond plants and ecology, supporting the overall well-being of the families and kids who visit us every day."
Improving the world
Once the plan for the library was in place, the team set up an online fundraiser to seek community support.
“We sent it out to a lot of people, and we just told them our mission, and a lot of people were very responsive,” Patrick said.
Community members stepped up beyond financial contributions, too. Patrick’s father helped her build and install the library. Two UK students, Maria Wanderley and Rylie Workman, joined The Shared Shelf to help out.
Neglia said it’s been great to see college students be part of a project like this.
“That really reflects well on our generation because we really do care, and there are a lot of us who are very passionate about making our world a better place,” Neglia said.
The team was intentional about decorating the Little Free Library, from choosing a “nature-like” handle for the door to what Patrick painted on the outside of the box. In addition to books, Patrick painted plants and insects that call Kentucky home — using a book she checked out from the public library for reference.
“We wanted to make sure we were accurate because at The Arboretum, horticulture and environmental sustainability are a very important thing,” Neglia said.
The monarch butterflies that Patrick added are a nod to her grandmother as well as to Dolly Parton, whose Imagination Library provides free books to children. The ribbon cutting for the Little Free Library was about a week before Parton’s death.
A free library for books at a place as popular as The Arboretum was a win for everyone, Neglia said.
“It’s an easy thing for people to come behind,” she said. “Everyone loves The Arboretum. Not everyone loves to read, but maybe they will after this.”
The Arboretum as launching pad
Neglia said The Shared Shelf hopes to establish more Little Free Libraries in Lexington areas that need greater access to health literacy resources and reading materials in general.
“The sky’s the limit for where we could put them,” Neglia said. “One of our big goals is to start collaborating with other organizations at the university because there are a lot of cool people doing really cool things, and we want to involve as many members of the community as we can.”
Patrick said The Arboretum was the right choice for the organization’s first library in Lexington: “the most perfect launching pad.”
Visitors are encouraged to pick up or donate books at the Little Free Library.
As the state’s flagship, land-grant institution, the University of Kentucky exists to advance the Commonwealth. We do that by preparing the next generation of leaders — placing students at the heart of everything we do — and transforming the lives of Kentuckians through education, research and creative work, service and healthcare. We pride ourselves on being a catalyst for breakthroughs and a force for healing, a place where ingenuity unfolds. It's all made possible by our people — visionaries, disruptors and pioneers — who make up 200 academic programs, a $1.02 billion research and development enterprise and a world-class medical center, all on one campus.