Electrifying Daguerreotypes
Rachel Nordstrom follows up here on her earlier post where she featured several of the daguerreotypes in the Library’s collections. Daguerreotypes are relatively rare in Scotland, and specifically so within the…
Search by category: conservation
Defining the boundaries: protection through housing and minimizing handling
Within the Burgh of Cupar charters collection (B13) is a document dated 5 April 1487 recording the marking of the boundaries of land belonging to the Burgh of Cupar and that of George Claphaine of Kerslogy [Carslogie].…
Out of the ashes: framing the panel of reagents
Part of the Library’s Special Collections role in caring for its irreplaceable historic collections of rare books, photographs and archives is to develop and maintain an Emergency Response Plan. Our Emergency Response…
Get your boards on: A new method of board re-attachment for tight-back bindings
A tour around the rare books in the Library’s Special Collections reveals many volumes with bands of cotton tape tied around them. The white tying tape serves to warn staff that the ‘tied’ volume is physically damaged…
A Day in a Bookish Cornucopia: surveying books from the Library’s Special Collections
The University of St Andrews Library Special Collections Division routinely commissions practical conservation of damaged material from Icon-accredited conservators. As part of the division’s policy on conservation,…
Reviving Art: The process of conserving a manuscript
In this week’s blog, Fatima Al Dhaif, a student studying for an MA in Conservation at Camberwell College of Arts, London, shares her experience of working on the conservation and analysis of one of the manuscripts from…
Boxing the collections: a review of a two-day workshop on magnetic box-making
The Special Collections Division of the University Library has an ongoing programme of boxing and housing collection items in custom-made enclosures of acid and lignin-free papers and boards. These enclosures protect…
Washing ‘the Bosphore’ and attaching Oriental sketches 2: treatment and results
In part I of this post, we saw the pre-treatment condition of ‘Le Bosphore’ and ‘Sketches in Turkey, Syria and Egypt’. In part II, the Library’s Preventive Conservator explains the treatment process and results of the…
Washing ‘the Bosphore’ and attaching Oriental sketches 1: before treatment
To start the New Year, we take a look at the conservation work carried out on two of our rare books, in this two-part blog. Two treasures from the Library’s Special Collections rare book holdings have recently been…
A trip to the book doctor for a broken spine
A copy of The Whole Booke of Psalmes in Prose and Meeter, printed in Edinburgh by Andro Hart in 1617 was presented to Special Collections by Roger and Frances Stewart in May 2017; to mark both the 400th anniversary of…