The parking garage of the Kansas City Public Library's downtown branch is faced with 25-foot-tall book spines — 22 oversize volumes that face the street like a giant's bookshelf. Titles include Catch-22, To Kill a Mockingbird, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, and Charlotte's Web. It's one of those pieces of public art that stops you in your tracks.
The library itself is worth entering: housed in a converted 1906 bank building, it has a grand reading room with ornate woodwork and high ceilings. Free and open to the public during library hours. Located at 10th and Baltimore Avenue in downtown.