[19]: 11 [20] During the extensive recovery efforts, the library occupied an abandoned Acme grocery store across the street from the museum.

The rare books were sent to Carolyn Price Horton, a leading restoration expert, who disassembled, washed, deacidified, and rebound them.

[22] The museum's collection of contemporary artworks includes pieces by significant artists such as Lino Tagliapietra, Dante Marioni, Klaus Moje, Karen LaMonte, Dale Chihuly, Libenský / Brychtová, Ginny Ruffner and Josiah McElheny.

The museum's Ben W. Heineman Sr. Gallery of Contemporary Glass focuses on vessels, objects, sculptures, and installations made by international artists from 1975 to 2010.

The gallery is named for the Ben W. Heineman Sr. family, who donated a major collection of contemporary glass to the museum in 2005.

Past exhibitions have included: Medieval Glass for Popes, Princes and Peasants,[24] East Meets West: Cross-Cultural Influences in Glassmaking in the 18th and 19th Centuries[25] and Mirror to Discovery: The 200-Inch Disk and the Hale Reflecting Telescope at Palomar.

Throughout the demonstration, a narrator describes the process, and cameras give viewers a close-up look into the furnaces where the glass is heated.

GlassLab's focus on material and process aims to help designers and artists realize new forms, functions and meanings for glass.

[36] It hosts The Rakow Research Library, which houses a collection of materials on the art and history of glass and glassmaking, and is open to the public.

The Rakow Research Library, founded as part of the CMOG in 1951,[37] is a public institution that houses a comprehensive collection of materials on the art and history of glass and glassmaking.

[38] The library collection ranges from medieval manuscripts to original works of art on paper to the latest information on techniques used by studio artists.

[39] The Canadian reality glassblowing competition television series Blown Away includes an artist residency at the CMOG as part of its prize.