Our first tour in the morning was of the Conservation department, and it was really interesting to hear about the work they're doing to digitize all of these old manuscripts and ancient works. We were only allowed to take notes with pencils because they take conservation very seriously.
Their guiding principles for conservation practices are
1. Make as minimal an impact as possible. They aim to preserve materials in pristine condition, and not mark them up.
2. Reversibility. If they do have to make marks on the materials for foliation purposes, they write the page numbers in pencil so that they can be removed if need be.
The coolest part was talking to the textile conservationist Elizabeth Rose about the work she was doing. Currently, she is working on restoring two flags that are hundreds of years old. She cleans, restores, and stitches them back into shape at a painstakingly slow pace.
It seems so fascinating, and like you could come in and become completely immersed in your work. She is working on a deadline of course, and it turns out she's a contract worker. But still, I'm very interested in her line of work. I wonder how one becomes a textile conservationist?
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