Museum Monday: Collections Risk Assessment

It can be overwhelming. It can hurt your brain. But it can also help you understand your collection’s preservation needs like nothing else. Collections risk assessment. Ready? Collections risk assessment evaluates the impact of different specific risks on a collections unit. It’s … Continue reading

Museum Monday – Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collections

Spinach? It’s our not-quite-precise pronunciation of the SPNHC acronym for the Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collections. Visit their website here. I have never worked for a natural history museum, but the challenges in preserving science collections for … Continue reading

Museum Monday: Collection Care Speaks – The Knole House Conservation Team Blog

How to cover a 400 year old mattress? Comparing dusts vacuumed from a chair every three years to tell if it is deteriorating? Condition survey of a stone floor, tile by tile? A mummified rat from the attic? That’s a … Continue reading

Museum Monday: Why Museums Don’t Have Pictures of Everything on Their Websites

I hear the occasional grumble. Why is that photo of that object so bad? Why isn’t there an online database? Why are only selected objects online? Why can’t museums get their acts together? I worked on a grant project for … Continue reading

Museum Monday – Off to Albuquerque for the AIC Annual Meeting!

This week I’m off to the American Institute for the Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works (AIC) annual meeting, this year in Albuquerque, New Mexico. It will be the first time I’ve visited New Mexico, so I’m looking forward to seeing … Continue reading

Museum Monday – What is a Collections Manager?

Nope, I’m not a curator; I’m a collections manager. Many visitors who stop me in the galleries try to demonstrate their museum savvy by asking “Are you the curator?” I take a moment to educate them about the various roles … Continue reading