Annual Review '25-26: Introducing The Kettle

When Undergraduate Engagement Librarians Amber Ovsak and Sarah McCall set out to reimagine an underused space on the third floor of Watson Library, they had a clear vision: create a welcoming environment where students could gather, recharge, learn, and build community — without it feeling like a classroom. The name they landed on says it all. A “kettle” is a group of hawks gliding together on rising thermal air currents, and in that same spirit, The Kettle was designed to be a place where every Jayhawk could lift each other up and soar.

With support from the Mary McCorison Rosenbloom Special Initiative Fund, Ovsak and McCall spent more than a year bringing that vision to life, collaborating with library colleagues across Undergraduate Engagement, Public Services, and the libraries' Makerspace. The result, located in Watson Library room 325, is a flexible, comfortable space — furnished for gathering and equipped with a large video monitor for film screenings. The room is open for students to study, connect, or simply decompress whenever programming is not in session.

Since launching, The Kettle has become home to weekly book clubs, drop-in student support hours, a seed library offering free herb, vegetable, and flower seeds to the campus community, and more. The space also has a growing collection of leisure activities like puzzles, games, and coloring supplies. One of the year's standout moments was a three-part Studio Ghibli movie series this spring, which went beyond a fun afternoon screening to include discussion led by KU Film and Media Studies' David Mai and Haskell Indian Nations University's David Titterington — combining a relaxing study break with a genuine cross-campus conversation about film and storytelling.

Students haven't just been visitors to The Kettle, they've helped shape it. To bring the space's name and spirit to life visually, KU Libraries partnered with a Visual Communications junior seminar taught by KU professor Jeremy Shellhorn. The class project generated 20 distinct mural concepts capturing what it means to "gather and soar," with students presenting initial concepts and revising based on library committee feedback. The selected design by Danny Duong — who coincidentally worked as a libraries student assistant in the digitization lab — features a wall of unique hawks, fluffy clouds, and native flowers. The mural was finished over the summer and will be officially unveiled at the start of the fall 2026 semester, becoming a lasting, student-designed centerpiece for a space built by and for students.

“The Kettle was born through several initiatives aligning in a meaningful way, and a desire to develop a flexible and welcoming space to host student programming,” said Jill Becker, head of the libraries’ Center for Undergraduate Initiatives & Engagement. “With encouraging support from library leadership, we now have the space we imagined.”

This story first appeared in KU Libraries 2025-26 Annual Review, a publication that reviews accomplishments of the past year and provides a glimpse of priorities moving forward. See this story and discover more in the full issue via the downloadable pdf.