PRESERconVersATION

Shrink Wrapping: Why Books Love It!

Imagine ... if only one book out of every twelve thousand in the Library's collections gets damaged each month, that means over five thousand books would need preservation treatment each year.

The number of items that require treatment of some sort, multiplied by the cost of such treatment gives us a figure of astronomical proportions. So obviously, full treatment of every item by Preservation Services is not possible and we have to find some other solution to this problem.

This is where shrink-wrapping is so useful. It is a quick and cheap way of reducing further deterioration of books that cannot be fixed immediately.

Shrink-wrapping involves surrounding the book in a special plastic and placing it in a machine that gives it a quick blast of heat to make the plastic shrink without affecting the book (Remember shrinking Twisties packets in the oven at home?). This makes the plastic fit snugly around the book without sticking to it, prevents losing broken pieces and provides some support for the item.

So you can see that we are not neglecting to care for our collections because we use shrink-wrapping. It is helping us to care for as much of them as possible.

Think of it as kind of a plastic hug for a book.

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