1. From Chaos to Order: Making Artifact Storage Work for You
Hilary
Presented by
Sonya Barron, Conservator
Hilary Seo, Head of Preservation
Parks Library

2. Session Outline
What to re-house: curatorial selection and prioritization
Collection materials, their chemical properties and housing needs
Modifying commercially available enclosures: case studies
Question and answer discussion
Table top exercise
Hands on time with samples of housing materials and supplier catalogs
Hilary

3. Selecting items to re-house: what to consider
Value to the collection, intellectual or monetary
Physical condition of the item
Frequency of handling
Storage space limitations
Financial constraints
Personnel and time
Hilary

4. Buffered, unbuffered and acid-free
I believe that there are seldom perfect housing solutions. You are going to hear a lot of information about the proper way to store different materials, and some of these techniques will be out of your reach because you are not in a position to take on this hands-on work, there is nobody on staff who could do this, or because you don’t have the funding to buy the products and supplies. I hope that you do not feel discouraged, that is the opposite of my intention. I want to offer you helpful information that will broaden your knowledge base about physical materials, and tell you about a wide range of options. Any small positive improvements that can you make in housing your collections are going to be beneficial and worth doing.
First, let me define some terms that archival suppliers use to describe their products.
Most paper-based products for archival storage are buffered. That means that the board or paper they are made of has an added calcium reserve to absorb acid. Paper, board and wood become increasingly acidic over time, so the alkaline buffer is meant to absorb that extra acidity. Archival paper products are buffered to approximately pH of 8.5 to pH of 9.
Unbuffered means pH-neutral, with a pH of 7. Anything below pH 7 is acidic.
When something is marketed as acid-free, it can be a misleading term. It literally means not acidic, which means pH of 7 and up.
A good indicator of a high quality archival product is to see whether it passed the PAT test, which is the Photographic Activity Test. It is a series of complicated and comprehensive tests that rates paper quality for storing the most sensitive collection items like photographs. The test is administered by the Image Permanence Institute in Rochester, NY. Many archival suppliers have had their products PAT-tested and advertise them as such. However, you might be surprised to learn that paper products that have passed the PAT can be either buffered or unbuffered. You need to look for the word “unbuffered” or a pH value to find out whether the product is buffered or not.
Buffered means pH 8 to pH 8.5
Unbuffered means acid-neutral, same as non-buffered = pH 7 to 7.5
Acid-free can mean either unbuffered or buffered = pH 7 to 8.5
PAT: Photographic Activity Test

5. Books and Paper: Chemical characteristics
Cellulose: cotton, linen or wood pulp fibers for western papers
Tanned leather and vellum/parchment: collagen
Sizing: gelatin, alum-rosin
Media: printing ink, writing ink, artist materials
Some prints are actually more like photographs chemically
Paper is made from cellulose, which is a plant-based substance. Cellulose is the building block of materials like cotton, linen and wood, as well as other less common plant-based fibers like kozo, flax or bark.
All paper items in your collections will eventually become acidic, but some will get there sooner than others. The rate of paper deterioration depends on its quality, whether it consists mostly of cotton or of wood pulp. Longevity of paper also depends on chemicals that are added to the pulp.
Acidic paper in your collections will have the following visual indicators of deterioration: it will be discolored (browned or yellowed); it will be brittle (not flexible, breaking easily instead of bending).
Many books are bound in leather. Leather is animal-based, a proteinacious material. So is parchment, which many charters and diplomas are written on.
Blueprints and diazo prints are photo-reproductions. They are actually more akin to photographs than to simple paper objects. The image is made with color dyes using a photographic process. There is a great book out there for identifying architectural prints in your collections. It’s called “Architectural Photoreproductions: A Manual for Identification and Care”. It features many pictures of the different kinds of architectural prints. The authors provide information on how the prints were made, what materials were used, when they were popular, and how to store them for long-term preservation.

6. Books and Paper: Housing options
Unbuffered paper folders (pH 7-7.5) COLOR THAT IS NON-PRINTED -hand-tinted maps and prints -watercolors -collages with wool or silk components -blueprints -diazo reproductions
Buffered paper folders (pH 8-8.5) PRINTED COLOR INK OK -documents -manuscripts -leather and paper bound books -maps -posters -prints -black & white drawings
Mylar (Melinex) -fragile paper, not fragile media
Unbuffered shallow boxes (pH 7-7.5) -powdering and flaking charcoal and pastel
Now a few words about buffered vs. unbuffered storage for paper-based collections. When in doubt, use UNBUFFERED. It does not harm any materials.
For storage of paper items, the important thing is to watch out for color dyes. Unbuffered folders and boxes are good for the following collection materials: color photographs, watercolors, hand-tinted prints and photos, diazo-prints and blueprints. The alkaline environment of a buffered enclosure can change the color chemistry of the dyes.
Use unbuffered for collages with wool and silk. Proteinatious materials should not be in an alkaline environment.
Buffered folders and boxes are ok for: black and white documents and manuscripts, books and items with printed color ink, like lithographs, screenprints or relief prints.
Parchment and leather used for bookbinding are ok to store in buffered enclosures, even though they are proteinatious. This is because the parchment and leather only are a thin layer. What is most important for storage of parchment is that relative humidity and temperature are kept stable and within the standard norm (Temperature below 70F, relative humidity from 30% to 50%).
Mylar (or Melinex) is ok to use for storing all materials. It is a chemically stable archival polyester film. Mylar L-sleeves are good for supporting brittle, torn and fragile paper. But it is very staticky, so don’t use a Mylar sleeve for an item with flaking ink, pigment or coating. The surface of Mylar will pull up the flakes.
Items with fragile flaking surfaces should be stored ‘flaking surface up’ in a shallow box with a lid.

7. Books and Paper: Examples of pre-fabricated housings
Image courtesy of Hollinger Metal Edge
Image courtesy of Gaylord Archival
Buffered paper folders
Image courtesy of Archival Products
Unbuffered paper folders
4-flap enclosure
Image courtesy of Miami University Special Collections and Archives
Image courtesy of Talas online
Mylar® (Melinex®) sleeves
Image courtesy of Talas online
Here are some examples of enclosures you can buy online from archival suppliers.
Most of the folders and boxes that you find in their catalogs are made from buffered board and paper. But you can find unbuffered products by searching specifically for the word ‘unbuffered’.
Paper folders usually come in 2 weights of board – 10pt and 20pt. Mylar (Melinex) sleeves can come either pre-sealed on 2 sides like the capital letter ‘L’, or they can come pre-sealed along the long side like a folder. The thickness of Mylar ranges from 2ml to 5ml.
For some 4-flap enclosures you can adjust the thickness of the box.
Another option is to order inexpensive custom-sized boxes. You give the supplier your measurements and they produce the box and mail it to you flat. Then you assemble it like you would a pizza box. Another option for protecting a book is to make a Mylar wrapper for it. Like wrapping a textbook in paper to protect it during the school year. A Mylar wrapper can be helpful in containing red rot. Red rot is the powdery orange leather residue that comes off on your hands. It is a byproduct of leather deterioration.
It is best to store large format rolled items rolled on top of tubes rather than stuffing them inside tubes. Taking rolled items out of tubes can damage the edges. If an oversized print or map is rolled on top of a tube, you can unroll it gently on a table surface. You can then roll a sheet of 4ml or 5ml Mylar on top of the print or map and tie up the entire package with cotton twill tape. Boxes for rolled items are available to buy in different sizes, so you can protect the outside of the roll. Unboxed rolls can also be safely hung on rods, similar to rolled textiles. Or you can put your roll-print-and-Mylar package inside a slightly larger tube and store it that way.
Architectural drawing/ Map storage
Image courtesy of CMI, Micro Climate Archival Boxes
Pre-fabricated clamshell
Image courtesy of Talas online
Pre-fabricated clamshell, reinforced
Image courtesy of Hollinger Metal Edge
Image courtesy of Talas online
Assembling a clamshell

8. Books and Paper: Modifications for pre-fabricated housings
Corrugated blue archival board
Spacers for a flat storage box
Spacers inside the box
Tools to construct a spacer
Here is one of many options you have: to make a spacer for a box that is too big for your item.
These spacers are made by laminating layers of corrugated archival blue board together, using fragments of double-sided tape. The name of the tape is 3M Double Coated Tape 415, it contains an archival, museum quality adhesive. You measure and cut strips of board and stack them on top of each other. Put pieces of double-sided tape between the layers to stick them together. You can stack the strips of board side by side or one on top of the other. The edges of the board can end up a little rough where you cut them, so you can have the cut edges face up like it is shown in this picture, so that the smooth side of the spacer is against the book. Or you can wrap the spacer in some tissue or Tyvek®.
If your box is too deep for the item, you can build up a platform out of pieces of board to elevate the book so it reaches to the top of the box.
3M 415® double-sided tape
Corrugated board and double sided tape

9. Books and Paper: Modifications to pre-fabricated housings
Folded 40pt spacer for a wedge –shaped book inside a 4-flap phase box
Folded corrugated boardspacer for an upright document box
Another way to make a spacer is to fold board instead of laminating pieces of it. You can fold corrugated board with a bone folder and a ruler to fill up empty space in a document box or a flat box. You can also buy pre-made adjustable spacers for standard document boxes.
If you have a book that is shaped like a wedge, you may need to make a wedge-shaped spacer to either put below your book or on top of your book. In this example 40pt board was used, and the spacer was attached to the bottom of the phase box. You need a board crimper to fold 40pt board because it is very rigid.
Folded corrugated board spacers for a flat storage box
Folded board spacers

10. Books and Paper: Modifications to pre-fabricated housings
Image courtesy of Archival Methods
Image courtesy of Talas online
Unbuffered bond paper
Image courtesy of Gaylord Archival
Unbuffered light weight interleaving paper
Unbuffered 20 pt folder stock
In the example with the framed charter, the spacers are wrapped in heavy-weight tissue. It is like wrapping a gift, using double-sided tape to close the ends of the package. Tyvek is a good material to use for wrapping spacers too. It’s durable, chemically stable, and has a smooth surface. It’s normally used for protective suits.
For books with fragile surfaces you can make a protective wrapper before putting them into a box. You have a vertical piece that you wrap the book in and then a horizontal piece that wraps around that. You can use heavy-weight archival paper, a bone folder and a ruler. You don’t have to attach the two parts of the wrapper together with tape, since it will go into a box.
If the book you are rehousing has protruding metal hardware on the binding or some other 3-dimensional parts that stick out, you may need to attach a piece of foam to the interior box to pad it out. If you are measuring for a custom-made box, make sure that you are taking these protruding parts into account and estimating extra space for them.
Interleaving paper and folder stock can be used in practical ways. For example, you may have blueprints already housed in buffered folders. But you know it’s best to store blueprints in unbuffered folders. You can put a sheet of unbuffered interleaving paper between the blueprint and the buffered folder, to create a protective barrier for the color dyes.
You may have a color-tinted photo that is mounted on acidic board. The acidic board benefits from a buffered folder, but the color photo needs unbuffered housing. You can put a sheet of unbuffered paper over the photo and use a buffered folder to benefit the acidic backing board. Or you can use an unbuffered folder for the sake of the photograph, and slip a sheet of buffered paper or folder stock behind the board to absorb some extra acidity. You can take care of the dual needs of the object in this manner.
Packing collection items for transportation:
Spacers can be wrapped in heavyweight tissue or Tyvek®
Protective wrapper: heavy weight buffered or unbuffered paper
Interleaving and wrapping with paper

11. Books and Paper: Modifications to pre-fabricated housings
Knives for cutting Ethafoam® block and sheets
Volara® foam, polyethylene bags, tissue, box
Ethafoam® cut-out forms
You can use Ethafoam® and Volara® foam to make spacers. Both foams are made from polyethylene, which is a chemically stable plastic.
You may need to fill up space in a box because you have a small book and you want it to have a larger profile on the shelf. You could use a box for a medium-sized book and put in spacers made from Ethafoam® to fill out the empty space around your small book. Ethafoam® comes in sheets that are ¼” or 1/8” thick or in block form. You can cut Ethafoam® sheets with a utility knife, an X-acto knife or a scalpel. Ethafoam® block can be cut with a large ceramic knife or a knife that is sold specifically for cutting Ethafoam®. Spacers do not need to be attached to the box permanently, if they fit snugly.
Volara® foam has a very smooth surface, it’s great to use for items that have fragile surfaces. For a miniature book, you can cut out a small shape in a sheet of foam and place your miniature inside the cut-out. In this case the sheet of foam does need to be attached to the box, so that it does not move when you take the item out from the cut-out.
Here is something to keep in mind when you are working with foam: Volara® foam adheres well with double-sided tape. Ethafoam® does not. Use archival PVA glue (polyvinyl acetate), like Jade 403®, to adhere pieces of Ethafoam® to the box or to each other. Jade 403® is like the archival version of Elmers’s® glue. Allow the bond to set under pressure and weight until the glue is dry. You will need to allow the glued Ethafoam® to sit out in the open and off-gas for 2 weeks before storing your item in the box with the lid closed.
Image courtesy of Talas online
Image courtesy of Gaylord Archival
Image courtesy of University Products
Volara® foam, scalpel blades and handles
Ethafoam® and Volara ® foam

12. Photographic materials: Chemical characteristics
Paper: good quality, low acidity photographic paper
Negatives: cellulose nitrate, acetate, polyester, glass
Low quality wood pulp backing board
Emulsion layer sensitive to oils in skin and to abrasion
A variety of photo-chemical processes
Let’s move on to photographic materials. There can be a great variety of photo processes present in your collections, especially if you have a lot of photos from the 19th and early 20th centuries, when photography was in its infancy. There are several good visual identification guides available to help you figure out what types of photographs you have.
Chemically, photographs are more complicated than simple paper objects. The emulsion layer is sensitive to the oils in our skin, so do wear nitrile examination gloves when handling photographs. Cotton gloves can be too bulky to handle paper safely, because you loose the sensitivity of your fingertips. There is no way to get a close fit with cotton gloves so they can snag on the edge of the paper.
The photo paper is almost always high quality, low acidity paper. But photographs were often adhered to backing boards. These were mostly made from low quality acidic board. They are usually brittle and break easily, talking the photograph with them. Photos that are mounted to backing boards need to be supported carefully, when you handle them.

13. Photographic materials: Housing options
Unbuffered paper folders (pH 7-7.5) COLOR -hand-tinted photo prints -albumen prints -cyanotypes -color prints, negatives, motion picture film -Polaroids -lantern slides, glass negatives -scrapbooks with wool or silk components
Buffered paper folders (pH 8-8.5) B&W -cellulose nitrate, acetate -b&w photo prints -b&w motion picture film
Mylar (Melinex) All OK -as long as RH < 70%
Mylar® sleeves and polyethylene pockets are ok to use for storage of all photo materials.
Buffered paper folders and sleeves are ok to use for: Black and white photos and negatives.
Unbuffered enclosures should be used for any items that contain color. As mentioned in an earlier slide, dyes can change color from being in an alkaline environment.
Use unbuffered enclosures for albumen prints because they contain egg-based protein. A visual ID guide to photo processes may help you to identify which prints in your collections are albumen. Albumen prints are usually yellowed and have a fine network of cracks on the surface.
Use unbuffered enclosures if you have a scrapbook that contains wool or silk pieces, which are proteinateous.
Image courtesy of Arab Image Foundation
Image courtesy of the Preservation Lab, Cincinnati Public Library/ University of Cincinnati

14. Photographic materials: : Examples of pre-fabricated housings
Image courtesy of Hollinger Metal Edge
Image courtesy of Gaylord Archival
Image courtesy of Gaylord Archival
Image courtesy of Gaylord Archival
Unbuffered paper pockets
Mylar (Melinex) sleeves
Negatives storage
Image courtesy of PZ Conservation C.I.C
Here are some examples of pre-fabricated housings for photographic materials. You could purchase buffered or unbuffered paper pockets or Mylar® sleeves. For large groups of smaller photos, you could opt for polyethylene photo pockets that are enclosed in a 3-ring binder made from archival board.
One of the advantages of using Mylar® sleeves for housing photos is that it provides little visual interference during scanning. Photos do not need to be removed from Mylar® (Melinex®) sleeves when imaged on a flatbed scanner.
In this slide you can see an example of a box of cyanotype prints in Mylar® sleeves, with a spacer. The spacer looks like it is a block of Ethafoam® wrapped in paper or Tyvek®.
If your photo has a fragile surface with a cracked or flaking emulsion layer, a shallow box is better suited for storage. The static of Mylar® film would disrupt the fragile surface.
When dealing with glass plate negatives and lantern slides, it is important to clear up some key differences between these types of photographic objects.
Glass plate negatives contain a negative image and are made of one piece of glass. One side of the glass has the emulsion layer, which is very fragile. This layer is matte. The other side of the glass is shiny. It is not coated by anything, it is simply the surface of the glass. It is best to house glass plate negatives in custom-fitted 4-flap folders. It’s safer to handle the glass plate on a flat surface, so there is less risk of dropping it. In a 4-flap folder there are no paper edges that can snag on the emulsion layer. Edges of paper pockets can scratch the surface of the emulsion.
Lantern slides contain a positive image. They are made from two pieces of glass that are sandwiched together and adhered along the edges with strips of tape, which is usually black. The vulnerable surface of the image is not exposed. It is protected by a plate of glass. However, failure of tape can cause the glass plates to become detached from each other. As in the case of glass plate negatives, 4-flap folders are the best storage solution for lantern slides.
Image courtesy of Van Der Hoorn Conservation Services
Image courtesy of Talas online
Glass plate negatives, 4-flaps, box
Mylar sleeves, unbuffered box with spacer
Photo prints box, unbuffered

15. Artifacts: Chemical characteristics
Plant-based (Cellulosic): bark, cotton, linen, paper, wood
Animal-derived (Proteinaceous): antler, bone, horn, ivory, leather (not books), quill, hair, silk, skin, wool
Metals: silver, iron, lead, nickel, other.
Natural history samples: herbarium collections, insects, skeletal material, birds and mammals
Plastics: cool, dry storage conditions
Image courtesy of Smithsonian Gardens
There are numerous challenges to be faced when dealing with housing and preservation of 3-dimensional artifacts. They are often made from multiple materials, making them composite objects. Their shapes and sizes are not standard.
The physical materials that make up 3-dimensional objects can be divided into several distinct groups.
Plant-based materials are made of cellulose, and include paper, board, wood, cotton and linen.
Animal-derived, or proteinaceous, materials are made up of collagen, and include leather (such as a saddle, moccasins, or a purse), silk, wool, bone and hair.
Metals can include silver, iron, lead, nickel, brass and bronze.
Natural history samples can take the form of herbariums and insect collections, as well as taxidermy.
Plastics and rubber are synthetic materials. They have a totally different chemistry and deteriorate in a different way.
Image courtesy of American Women’s Volunteer Service

16. Artifacts: Housing options
Unbuffered boxes, tissue (pH 7-7.5) PROTEINACEOUS -antler, bone, horn, ivory, quill -wool, silk -leather (not books), skin -insects, skeletal materials -taxidermy METALS -silver, iron, lead, brass, nickel, steel, etc.
Buffered boxes, tissue (pH 8-8.5) CELLULOSIC -wood, bark -cotton, linen, paper -botanical herbarium collections
Polyethylene/ polypropylene bags OK for all objects -RH must be < 70% -plastics
-metals
Image courtesy of Vintage Textile
As I mentioned before, when in doubt, use UNBUFFERED. It can’t harm any materials.
Only use unbuffered boxes and tissue for proteinateous materials and for metals.
Buffered boxes and tissue are ok to use for plant-based materials.
Old plastics and rubber should be put in resealable archival polyethylene bags. Archival polyethylene bags are made from non-recycled plastic. Cool and dry storage is particularly important for plastics and rubber.
It is a good idea to actually label your unbuffered tissues and folders with a stamp or with a pencil. That way you can be sure of what you are using.
Polyethylene and polypropylene bags are ok for all types of artifacts. If your object needs extra support, you could slip a sheet of Volara® foam or Ethafoam® into the bag and place the object on top of the sheet of foam.
Most 3-dimensional objects need individualized support within a standard-sized enclosure. The fastest fix is to use tissue to pad out the box and create supportive mounds (like in the example with the metal airplane, seen above). You can also fill a soft form with gently balled tissue (like in the case of the soft shoe, seen above).
Image courtesy of the State Museum of Pennsylvania
Image courtesy of Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Image courtesy of Cnetre De Recherche Sur La Conservation Des Collections, Paris, France
Image courtesy of Central Washington University

17. Small artifacts: Examples of pre-fabricated housings and modifications
Image courtesy of Gaylord Archival
Image courtesy of Gaylord Archival
Image courtesy of Gaylord Archival
Image courtesy of Hollinger Metal Edge
Pre-made compartments that can be manually adjusted
A multitude of small shifting boxes
When you have a collection of small items grouped together, you need to have them physically organized and stationary. If you have a whole bunch of little boxes shifting around inside a big box, that is not a safe storage solution. In this case you would need to open each box individually to look at every item, which subjects the objects to lot of unnecessary handling.
The examples of archival boxes above have different sizes of compartments. All of these boxes have lids to protect the artifacts in storage. Some of the compartments are designed to be adjustable, others have to be slightly modified. You can take out some walls or add more walls to have the box fit your collection items.
You can use soft tissue, Ethafoam® or Volara® foam to line the bottom of the compartments and to make spacers for individual compartments. Another advantage of housing small items in uncovered compartments is that you can view the entire collection together, which makes it easier to show to patrons.
In this slide you can see an example of using Teflon® film to line a cut-out shape in a block of Ethafoam®. Teflon® film is smooth and slightly stretchy. It can be used for artifacts with fragile, flaking or powdering surfaces. The film comes in a roll. It’s not cheap but the roll is big and it lasts a long time.
Image courtesy of Gaylord Archival
Image courtesy of Ellen Carlee Conservation
Modified small boxes secured in place
Image courtesy of Hollinger Metal Edge
Image courtesy of University Products
Modular boxes that fit together
Fragile surfaces: crater cut in Ethafoam®, lined with Teflon® film

18. Large artifacts: : Examples of modified storage
Image courtesy of Ellen Carlee Conservation
Large artifacts secured to board platforms
Storage of framed objects
Image courtesy of Southwest Solutions
Image courtesy of Gwen Spicer Conservation
Adapting traditional library stacks for artifact storage
Then we have large scale artifacts. Many of them cannot be put into a box. Above are some fun examples of 3-dimensional objects in the stacks and how they can be supported.
The snow shoes, masks and figures in the picture in the top left corner are placed onto platforms made of archival corrugated board. There are small spacers holding them in place. Some objects have cotton twill tape tied around them to add security. Of course the whole platform needs to remain horizontal, but the spacers help prevent shifting when you move the artifact off and onto the shelves.
The housing of parasols shows a combination of techniques – Tyvek® lining against fragile surfaces, cotton twill ties for security, cut-outs in Ethafoam® to slot the tips of the parasols into, and box walls made from corrugated board to fit the irregular shape of the object. Every little bit of space in the drawer is utilized.
To the right of that you have framed object storage within a museum. It is best to unframe items and to folder them. But if you have to keep your items in their frames, it is best to stack frames vertically within defined compartments. Frames can be interspersed with pieces of corrugated board or coroplast. Coroplast is similar to corrugated board but it is made from archival plastic. Shelf compartments can be lined with sheets of 1/8” Ethafoam® so that frames can slide in and out without getting scratched.
For a flat object like a fan, a cut-out in a sheet of Volara® foam is a good solution.
Pottery and baskets can be supported with rings and other shapes cut out of Ethafoam® block.
Many large items can be stored directly on the shelves in the stacks. A variety of supports can be used, like dummy shapes, board pedestals or shallow trays with Ethafoam® spacers. To avoid dust, you may choose to drape large artifacts with unbleached, unstarched muslin covers.
If your artifacts are covered up by muslin or in boxes, it can be helpful to add a visual ID tag. You can take a picture of the object inside the enclosure and put that picture on an ID tag or attach it to the outside of the box. That image will help you make a fast connection to the object. Knowing what’s inside the box or beneath the cover may effect the way you choose to handle the item.
Image courtesy of Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Modified flat file drawers
Image courtesy of Central Washington University
Image courtesy of Gwen Spicer Conservation
Image courtesy of the Porches Museum
Shelves lined with Ethafoam®
Volara® foam cut-out
Ethafoam® ring support

19. Textiles: Examples of modified storage
Image courtesy of Gaylord Archival
Image courtesy of Spicer Art Conservation
Variety of padded textile supports
Image courtesy of Museum Services Corporation
Pre-fabricated box for textile storage
Image courtesy of Fraser, Spafford and Ricci Conservation
Image courtesy of Gaylord Archival
Cotton stockinette and polyester batting
Workshop participants making padded hangers
Image courtesy of Spicer Art Conservation
Textile objects can come in the shape of garments, rolled oversized textiles or decorative objects.
Smaller rolls can be rolled in soft unbuffered tissue and stored in archival roll boxes. It’s important to use really soft tissue, not tissue that tents and crinkles. Textile surfaces are too fragile to be in contact with sharp pointy edges. Rolled textiles can also be covered in unbleached unstarched muslin to protect against dust. This is helpful for oversized rolls that are too big to box. Textiles rolled on tubes can be hung on metal rods attached to a rack, or they can be propped up on Ethafoam® blocks with slots cut through them.
When a historic garment is boxed, it is helpful to pack the garment with softly balled tissue to give it some dimension and to support the fabric so that it is not crushed. Parts of the garment can be gently folded under to fit into the box. The large rectangular box in this slide has a sling that can be used to lift the textile out.
Padded hangers are helpful if you want to hang the garments, provided they are in stable enough condition to be hung and are not stretchy. Polyester batting is a good stuffing material, it is often used for quilts and pillows. You stuff the batting into sterile cotton stockinette to pad out the hard edges of the hangers. Aside from hangers, you can make lots of other padded shapes to support textiles within a box or textiles that are mounted and hung: pillows, rods, combination shapes.
Stockinette and polyester batting snakes can be made into rings that can support baskets and pottery. You can safely set an object with a rounded base into the soft donut pillow.
Image courtesy of CCAHA
Modified box for textile roll storage
Image courtesy of Spicer Art Conservation
Costumes stored on padded hangers
Storage of oversized rolled textiles

20. Custom-made housings for artifacts: Storage and display
Carrie Chapman Catt graduation photo
Image courtesy of Iowa State University, Parks Library, Special Collections and University Archives
The examples I am going to briefly talk about now are more complicated to construct. They are made from scratch for specific artifacts. These kinds of projects require the services of a professional like a conservator, a bookbinder or an art preparetor. Most institutions don’t employ a conservator, and don’t have a budget to contract out for conservation services. But I still want to share some examples with you to demonstrate the full range of options that exist out there.
All of these objects come from Iowa State University’s Special Collections and University Archives. The housings were constructed in the Preservation lab by our conservation technician and our intern.
This is an example of a collection of small Women’s Suffrage buttons with silk ribbons. These belonged to Carrie Chapman Catt. The buttons were all stored in individual tiny boxes with lids, and then all the little boxes were put together into a big box, where they shifted around. The little boxes were padded out with unbuffered tissue.
There are pre-fabricated boxes that could have been purchased to house this collection. The ready-made compartments could have been retrofitted with spacers to accommodate individual items. Some of the compartments could have been cut away to create a larger space. But our conservation technician is very excited about making housings and is very good at it, so she just went for it.
This is a dual storage/short-term display solution where the buttons remain stationary. The box has 2 levels, - a bottom level and a tray that you can take out. You can see that the Ethafoam® crater cuts-outs are lined with Teflon® film to provide a smooth surface for metal and silk.
Silk is naturally acidic. It does not age well, becoming extremely brittle and fragile. Our technician put small sheets of Mylar® over the flat silk ribbons to better protect them. The silk is very sensitive to static and to being brushed up against, so the Mylar® cover sheet keeps the ribbons from lifting out of the box.
I will tell you a cautionary tale that about packing with tissue: things can get lost inside the folds. When our technician was rehousing the collection she found a “never-before-seen” button that was not included in the catalog record. It had been lost on the bottom of one of the little boxes, below another similar button.
Storage and display for a group of small objects

21. Custom-made housings for artifacts: Storage and display
Mildred Day, ISU graduate Inventor of the Rice Krispie Treat
Image courtesy of the Des Moines Register
Rolling out the giant Rice Krispie treat at ISU’s College of Nutritional Sciences
This special object is a very old Rice Crispie treat. The original Rice Crispie treat was invented by Mildred Day, an Iowa State University grad. This particular Rice Crispie treat came from the 2001 ISU VISHEA student festival (Veterinary Medicine, Engineering, Industrial Science, Home Economics, Agriculture) . It’s a small slice cut from the ‘Biggest Rice Crispie Treat Ever Made’. Amazingly, although it is hardened, the treat still looks rather appetizing and it smells pretty good.
The thing to do with perishable items like this one is to seal them. We also take our perishable items through a freeze-and-thaw cycle to kill off insects, their eggs and larva, as well as to eradicate mold spores. The specifications for the freeze-and-thaw cycle are as follows: -Set your freezer temperature to -20C (-5C). -Double-bag or triple-bag the object in archival polyethylene resealable bags. Don’t use very thin polyethylene.
-Gently squeeze all the air out the bags. -Freeze for 48 hours. -Take out of the freezer and thaw at room temperature for 24 hours. -Put back into the freezer for another 48 hours. -Take out of the freezer and thaw for 24 hours. (Source: Conserv-O-Gram 3/6, 1994, NPS)
This Rice Crispie treat has been sealed on all sides in polyethylene film on a Colibri jacket machine. It is nearly as effective to double-bag your perishables in resealable polyethylene archival bags and squeeze all the air out. This is a simple pre-fabricated Metal Edge box with an Ethafoam® cut-out and a Volara® foam lining.
Storage for a perishable item
Image courtesy of the Des Moines Register

22. Custom-made housings for artifacts: Storage and display
This airplane model was constructed by Iowa State University’s Curtiss-Wright Engineering Cadets, who were all women. The model airplane is not stable structurally. As you can see in this photo, a part of the tail is not attached. This is how the airplane was housed for many years – packed in unbuffered tissue paper.
This is not a bad storage situation. The box was well padded-out. But the airplane is one of the items that always gets brought out for public events during Homecoming Week. It was important to house it in a box that could also serve as a short-term display platform.
The front of the box drops down, the platform slides out. There are small blocks attached to the platform to support the wings and the tail. The whole airplane is strapped into place with polyethylene exhibit strapping.
There is an easier way to make this type of box. You could make use of a pre-fabricated box with a drop-down side. You might need to encourage the drop down side to fold down further by bending it outward a few times.
A platform or a shallow tray could be built using pieces of corrugated archival board, attached together with double-sided tape. Support blocks could be made from Ethafoam® block, as well from scored/folded mat board or corrugated board. Instead of attaching pull ribbons to the front of the platform/tray you could cut slots in the front side of the tray. You could put your fingers into these slots to pull the tray out.
Image courtesy of Iowa State University, Parks Library, Special Collections and University Archives
Storage and display for a mounted object

23. Custom-made housings for artifacts: Storage and display
This artifact is an original ISU Freshman Beanie from Up until 1934 ISU freshmen were required to wear this type of felt hat to show that they were freshmen. Wearing their freshman beanie earned them all kids of general harassment from the upper classmen. At the end of the freshman year it was a tradition to make a great big bonfire on the front lawn and to burn all of that year’s freshman beanies, plus a giant replica of a beanie. The students would just toss their hats into the fire. Cathartic!
Like the airplane, the beanie is displayed for many of our VIP events, a few hours at a time. This storage/display solution is great because the beanie does not have to be handled at all in order to show it. The hat rests on a covered Ethafoam® form that is attached to an aluminum stand. The stand fits snugly into the box. The sides of the box drop down so you can see the hat perfectly and you don’t have to take the stand out.
An easier way to make such an enclosure is to adapt a few techniques used for the airplane box, described in the previous slide. Create a shape to support the hat, like a covered Ethafoam® form or a muslin pillow that you sew (use unbleached unstarched muslin, stuff with polyester batting or gently balled-up soft tissue). Secure the support form onto a platform or within a shallow tray. Place the platform/tray inside a box that has a drop-down side. To make pulling the tray out easier, cut-out slots for your fingers on the front side of the tray.
Image courtesy of Iowa State University, Parks Library, Special Collections and University Archives
Box and display stand for a garment