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Above an ornate iron staircase, marble busts of past presidents and members watch over the reading room of the Mercantile Library, with its molded fireplace and grand piano. It is an elegant space befitting one of the three private libraries remaining in New York City.
Founded in 1820 by merchants and their clerks before “the advent of public libraries,” as the library’s Web site says, the Mercantile last month shut the doors of its eight-story white marble neoclassical building at 17 East 47th Street, which has been its home since 1932.
The library had sought to renovate its headquarters, but the cost is beyond its means, and so the Mercantile is selling the building and looking for new home. Noreen Tomassi, the library’s executive director, declined to divulge the price or the name of the buyer, but said the new owner intends the preserve the building.
In the meantime, plans for the library’s reinvention are under way, including a new name — the Mercantile Library Center for Fiction — to emphasize its focus on fiction. Since becoming the library’s executive director in 2004, Ms. Tomassi has been steering the Mercantile toward becoming more of a literary arts center that can play a part in keeping the narrative book form alive. Besides better serving its some 800 dues-paying members, she wants the library to be more of a destination for established authors and emerging writers.
The decision to sell the building has caused concern among some members, particularly because a new home has yet to be found. “To shut the building down without another one bought and waiting is simply foolish,” Michele Slung, an editor and a member, said in an e-mail message.
In a post on the library’s Web site, Ms. Tomassi said, “I understand that this all sounds a bit scary, but it’s also very exciting. When this transition is complete, we’ll christen the new building as the home of the only literary organization in the United States solely devoted to the art of fiction.”

nytimes.com