Tuesday, June 11, 2013

The Many Options For Quality Museum Storage

By Teri Farley


Many ways of storing museum quality artifacts involve preserving the artifact, organizing them, or mounting them. Each type of artifact might have a different form of museum storage and display. The type, value, and nature of the artifacts often dictates what the artifact is stored in. Some storage options are wood, Plexiglas, metal, glass, or other types of materials. What type of storage the artifact or artifacts need normally dictates the material used.

It is important to remember that storing an artifact does not have to be time consuming or overly complex. It is important to understand each of the methods of artifact archiving before using them to keep the artifacts from being damaged.

This is particularly important when a collection is rotated through the museum and then back into the archives. Many of the different options are meant for display purposes as well as archive purposes. These are the most comment methods are easily packed away for shipping or can be put on display as is with out having to change the type of case.

Many of the cases like these can be shifted without exposing the actual artifacts to air or adverse conditions. Not having to change the cases in between showing the artifact and storing them also helps prevent the risk of the artifact being dropped or damaged.

Some artifacts can be easily grouped together and placed in larger movable cases. These cases are similar to the cases found in stores to display jewelry or other items. These large cases can be moved to and from the archives. Smaller cases can either be packed together for a more space friendly option if the facility does not have a large area for artifact archiving.

Many artifacts are stored in their clear glass or Plexiglas cases. This way they can be removed from display and archived when they need to be. Some smaller pieces can be put into a large display case like those used in stores. These cases are usually lockable and can be easily moved when the collection is changed out.

Wooden crates are sometimes used in both shipping and storing artifacts. Each of these artifacts are usually put in a variety of packing materials. Some materials used are straw, Styrofoam peanuts, or cloth. Most of these materials are used so that the artifacts will not be damaged during transport. Most of the wooden crates can be used for different artifacts if the need arises. Regardless of the purpose the container museums generally keep several options on hand just in case they are needed.

Some of the museum storage options that museums decide to use are purely for security. Valuable artifacts are normally put into storage in safes or locked cases. Many different types of safes exist from small lock boxes to full sized wall safes. Some of the safes are also equipped with advanced security systems to protect the particularly valuable pieces in a collection of artifacts. Most of the art collections and valuable historic collections are housed in very sophisticated boxes, crates, safes, and vaults.




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