A Heavenly Rehousing Project!

Today we have the final instalment of a two-part series from Collections Care Assistant, Sarah Partington. In this post, she talks about cleaning and  rehousing a collection of works by the Gaelic Baptist preacher and hymn writer, Padruig Grannd. Sarah has just completed a government-funded Kickstart placement and has now started a new role working with our collections at the University Collections Facility.


The Peter Grant Collection comprises volumes of works by the Gaelic Baptist preacher and hymn writer, Padruig Grannd. These were stored together in a box, along with other printed works, manuscript sermon notebooks, and items pertaining to one of his descendants, Daniel Grannd. The material was put together in the 50s and it had unfortunately experienced the effects of unsuitable storage conditions over the years prior to it coming into the care of the Centre for Research Collections. This was obvious from its condition: in addition to the more common issues with older books, such as surface dirt, loose boards, text blocks and spines, most of the items in the box also showed serious signs of mould, residual staining, and warping from damp conditions in past storage. Conservators and archivists alike will get shudders when they hear whispers of attics, basements or garages…the likely former home of this collection.

The collection in its original housing

Although collated in the 1950s, the collection didn’t actually arrive to The School of Scottish Studies until the 90s. After 20-odd years under the University’s care, it was about  time that this incredibly special collection got the in-depth treatment and rehousing it deserves– as Collections Care Assistant, that’s where I came in!

I began by checking each item thoroughly in order to wheedle out the items showing signs of inactive or worse, active mould, which could spread if left untreated. I breathed a big sigh of relief when I didn’t find any active mould, but as a precaution I still placed the items with past mould damage to the side to avoid any potential cross-contamination. After this, cleaning work could begin on the items that I had identified as being free from the clutches of mould spores.

Left: removing ingrained dirt with a smoke sponge. Right: brushing away dust with a soft brush

I carefully brushed away the dust from the covers, fore-edge and top-edge of each book, after which I used a smoke sponge to remove ingrained surface dirt from the covers, end papers and text blocks. I repeated the same process on the notebooks and loose leaf material, but I was careful to avoid rubbing off any handwritten text or drawings, cleaning around these parts.

FYI, you will notice from the photos that I wore nitrile gloves when I was cleaning the items. This was just in case I came across any mould that I had missed when checking the books initially. Generally, books should be handled with clean, dry hands unless a health hazard is suspected or they have parts made from another material that requires gloves when handling, i.e. metal.

Any books that were structurally unstable and had loose text blocks, spines or covers, were then identified for further attention. In mild cases two cotton tape ties sufficed for securing the covers and spines, but in a large number of cases the books were in such a fragile condition that they needed a custom-made box to stop loose or friable (not the yummy kind) parts falling off. I put these items to the side to return to later.

Cleaning in the fume cupboard

Meanwhile, I began tackling the mouldy items. I put a protective and very stylish FFP3 mask on to protect myself from breathing in the mould spores, and placed the contaminated items in the fume cupboard. I combed each item for mould deposits, and used a museum vacuum on a low-suction setting to then remove them. After they were free from mould, I followed the same process that I had applied to the other items, brushing dust away and using a smoke sponge for ingrained dirt.

Inactive mould before and after cleaning. The reduction in mould spores is visible in the image on the right.

Now that everything was clean and mould-free, it was time to return to the fragile volumes that still needed some TLC. I measured them all, adding a couple of millimetres buffer room to my measurements to allow space for the folds of the rehousing material. I then created individual housing using a cutting board, scalpel and guillotine; I made phase boxes – four flap enclosures designed to protect delicate or damaged books – from museum-grade box board, which is a tough acid-free paper board, casings with spine support for smaller notebooks, and four flap folders for loose leaf material.

Making a custom phase box

I had to do a bit of problem solving here, as it wasn’t always obvious which rehousing solution would be best for a particular item. For example, a collection of printing proofs proved pretty hard to store. They had previously been stored folded up, causing the paper to bend. I consulted our paper conservator, Mhairi Boyle, and she suggested housing them in such a way that they could be made to lie more flat, without the need for further interventive treatment at this stage.

Left: printing proofs in custom folder. Right: printing proofs in custom phase box

Initially, I thought that a folder would work best for this, but the proofs didn’t fit in my custom folder, even though it had been measured to the correct size. The folder didn’t allow the necessary wiggle room for the 2.5cm bends, and it certainly wasn’t strong enough to coerce the paper into a flatter shape. In order to tackle this problem, I resorted to the largest ruler and cutting mat the conservation studio had to offer and I made another custom box for it instead. In the end I had housing that was long enough for the proofs, whilst allowing them 1.5cm depth so that the bends could be flattened out slightly.

The rehousing solution: archival box with fragile volumes in phase boxes

The last step in the Peter Grant saga was separating out the material into archival boxes in a coherent way. I put the items in three categorised archival boxes: printed works by Peter Grant in order of volume, other works, and pre-print items. If you like organisation and tidiness like I do, I think you’ll agree that the end result is very satisfying. More importantly, the collection is now more secure, and its future more certain.

Bearing Witness: The Pre-Digitisation Conservation Treatment of The Witness, Part 1

This week we have the first instalment of a two-part series by Projects Conservator Mhairi Boyle. Mhairi spent April 2022 working on The Witness, a collection of Edinburgh-based newspapers held by New College Library.


As a child I remember the local tabloid newspaper being delivered every morning, and my dad examining the daily happenings over his morning coffee before heading off to work. At the time I was more interested in the horoscopes and agony aunt sections. Weekends were a more relaxed affair, with a much larger (and more sophisticated) newspaper that barely fit onto the kitchen table. Considered ephemera, the newspaper was read once then discarded, with little thought lent to the matter.

The January 1842 copy of The Witness.

These days I rarely, if ever, purchase a physical newspaper. With the reign of the Digital Age, the news is accessible through the swipe of a fingertip via various apps and videos all shown on a tiny cellular screen. Critical stories are updated by the second with live news feeds, which means you can scroll to your hearts content on a regular basis.

I hadn’t given the modern consumption of news much thought until I was asked to assess the condition of a collection of newspapers belonging to the School of Scottish Studies. The Witness collection comes in two formats: there are 23 folders of partially loose issues which appear to have been removed from bound book volumes, and 26 much larger volumes. As part of a larger digitisation project which aims to make The Witness accessible online, I was asked to assess the condition of the loose monthly volumes prior to them being sent off to an external company to be scanned. Because they are so large, it takes two people to produce one item at the New College Library. Digitising The Witness will enable ease of access to all readers and reduce the need for handling such large items. I met Senior Collections Manager Katharine Richardson at the University Collections Facility to assess the newspapers.

Newspapers are also great forums for practising cursive.

Why is the preservation of these newspapers important? Historic newspapers are physical encapsulations of everything from historic world-changing events to opinion columns which echo the thoughts and feelings of communities from different eras. The Witness is an Evangelical Christian newspaper which was issued twice-thrice weekly from January 1840-February 1864.

The 23 loose monthly items vary from poor to excellent condition. The dates of the newspapers range from January 1842 to October 1843. During this period, a transition was being made from using cotton rags to make paper to using wood pulp, an inexpensive alternative. Wood pulp paper tends to become yellowed, brittle, and crumbly over time, whereas cotton rag paper tends to be strong and better-preserved. Thankfully The Witness was printed on a good quality cotton rag paper, which means that despite the wear and tear incurred through a century of use, the paper is still of a good and sturdy quality.

A large tear obscuring the text block, and some split areas where the paper has previously been folded.

The most concerning issues with the newspapers were tears encroaching into the text block, areas of weakness due to being folded, and fragile pages where the papers had previously been bound together into one area.

A failed historic repair.

An interesting (and challenging) aspect of the condition of the collection is the damage caused by historic repairs. Conservation is a constantly evolving profession with new techniques and adhesives being produced every year, which means that occasionally my job involves removing historic repairs if they are causing damage to objects. Many of the newspapers had old repairs administered with an unknown adhesive, which had failed and split over time.

Two layers of binding: the original adhesive is yellowed and hardened, and the single thread was added later on.

In addition to this, a well-meaning repairer had also taken the time to painstakingly individually ‘bind’ each disbound newspaper with a single piece of thread. Unfortunately, this thread has caused issues regarding the structural stability of the newspapers, causing areas of tension and fragmentation throughout.

After surveying the newspapers, I formulated an action plan, which included a few ethical dilemmas and consultations along the way. Digitising the newspapers involves pressing them under flat scanners, which meant that they required stabilisation through remedial conservation treatment. The ethical questions involved, and the remedial treatment of the newspapers, will be discussed further in Part 2 of this blog series: coming to an online news outlet near you soon!

Putting the Pieces Together: The Challenges of Working on Architectural Models (Part 2)

This week we have the final part of Project Conservator Mhairi Boyle’s series on the conservation treatment of three Percy Johnson-Marshall architectural models. The first part can be read  here.

Putting the Pieces Together: The Challenges of Working on Architectural Models (Part 2)

In my last blog, I introduced the Percy Johnson-Marshall architectural models, and the challenges faced when designing a treatment plan for them. In this week’s blog, I am going to tackle the topic of different adhesives and treatment methods used in this project.

In the field of paper conservation, there are a few gold-standard adhesives. The most ubiquitous adhesive that almost all paper conservators use is wheat starch paste. Though most conservators associate starch-based adhesives with East Asian conservation practices, one of the earliest recorded uses for starch was recorded in Ancient Egypt, where it was used to adhere pieces of papyrus together.

Powdered wheat starch mixed with water over heat forms a gelatinous paste, which can be tailored to suit different purposes. It can be kept thick (‘dry’), or thinned out with more water. Dry paste is often used to mend thicker paper-based objects or objects which cannot tolerate a lot of moisture, and thinned out paste is used when more flexibility is required. I decided to use a very dry paste to attempt to re-adhere lifting areas of the models, with varying degrees of success. Wheat starch paste requires at least 10-15 minutes to dry, meaning that the part of the object being repaired with paste needs weighted down. Although wheat starch paste is a strong and reliable adhesive, the extent of the water damage and the embrittlement of the card used in areas of the model meant that it was not strong enough to re-adhere parts of the model.

Collections Care Assistant Sarah Partington and I then moved onto using EVA glue. EVA stands for ethylene-vinyl acetate. It is a synthetic adhesive that was adopted by conservators in the 1980’s as a more reversible (but still challenging to remove) alternative to the completely irreversible PVA (poly-vinyl acetate). EVA is commonly used

Loose and lifting areas of one of the models.

in book conservation and artefact conservation. It’s stronger than wheat starch paste, but also has a longer ‘curing’ time. Rather than ‘drying’, adhesives like EVA and PVA react with the environment and form flexible solids.

Using EVA worked in some cases, but again, the drying time was not quick enough for the thicker cards used on the model. We also found that the weights we were using during the drying process were not quite the right size. At this stage, I turned to our Musical Instruments Conservator Jonathan Santa Maria Bouquet for some assistance.

Jonathan has experience dealing with an incredibly dynamic collection of 3D objects, chiefly musical instruments, and his workshop reflects this. Whereas paper conservators often have nimble and petite tools in their arsenal, Jonathan has saws, drills, clamps, and hammers.

Custom acrylic weights made by Jonathan Santa Maria Bouquet.

He very kindly lent Sarah and I some clamps to hold areas of the models in place while drying and created some custom-shape acrylic weights for us to use.

In addition to this, Jonathan suggested we try the adhesive Paraloid B72. B72 is an acrylic resin which has been used in conservation for over 25 years, and is commonly associated with archaeological and objects conservation. It is manufactured as small hard pellets which are then dissolved in a solvent of choice. Solvents are chosen based on how quickly they evaporate and their compatibility with the object – the quicker a solvent dissolves/dries, the quicker the adhesive will dry. Jonathan recommended a 50/50 mix of acetone and isopropanol, to give a medium-fast drying time.

From left to right: wheat starch paste, EVA, and Paraloid B72.

The B72 was a success – in conjunction with the custom weights and clamps, Sarah and I managed to successfully adhere all loose components of the models. It dried quickly, and the clamps and custom weights allowed us to apply a stronger and more precise amount of pressure to drying areas.

Clamping an area of the model to allow the Paraloid B72 to dry.

Successfully re-adhered components.

Acid-free tissue was built up to create an even plane, reducing the risk of pieces coming loose.

After the models were made secure, Senior Collections Manager Katharine Richardson and I met to discuss the safe packing and moving of them. Sarah and I prepared for their move by covering them in acid free tissue, filling in any gaps between built-up areas so that they wouldn’t come loose and knock against each other. The external removals contractors then arrived, and we discussed the safest method of moving the models. Large plastic bags were used to cover the models and tissue, and everyone held their breath as the largest model was tipped on its side to fit through the door.

Everything remained secure, and the models made it safely to the University Collections Facility. This project demonstrated the importance of cross-disciplinary collaboration and wouldn’t have been possible without the whole team mucking in to put the pieces together.

Sarah and one of the models, all in one piece!

Further Reading:

Whitten, J., Buckley, B., Houp, H., Vagts, L., Irgang, H., van Gelder, M., Blakney, S., Roth-Wells, N., & Pocobene, G. 1997, Varnishes and Surface Coatings: Polymeric Varnishes, https://www.conservation-wiki.com/wiki/Varnishes_and_Surface_Coatings:_Polymeric_Varnishes

Koob, SP. 2009, ‘Paraloid B-72: 25 Years of Use as a Consolidant and Adhesive for Ceramics and Glass.’, in Ambers, J., Higgitt, C., Harrison, L., & Saunders, D. (eds) Holding It All Together: Ancient and Modern Approaches to Joining, Repair and Consolidation, London: Archetype Publishing, Ltd., pp. 113-119.

Menei, E. 2017, ‘Use of East Asian materials and techniques on papyrus: Inspiration and adaptation’ in Adapt & Evolve 2015: East Asian Materials and Techniques in Western Conservation, pp. 118–27.