Now that we’ve defined cultural heritage and preservation, and how these concepts apply to your own collections, it’s time to learn about deterioration and how we can slow it down. First, we need to know what we’re up against! In our home environment, sources of deterioration include:
- Temperature, Humidity & Light
- Pollution, Dust & Clutter
- Pests & Mold
- Inherent Material Weaknesses
We’ll do a post on each bullet point, starting with temperature, humidity, and light.
When it comes to temperature, we are most concerned with heat. Certainly, high temperatures can cause direct damage by melting components or warping materials. Heat, of course, is energy. So, if the room where you are storing your collections is moderately warm, like an attic, heat is providing more energy to all the chemical reactions taking place in that room – including the reactions that are working to break down your collections.
Humidity is also called “relative humidity” or “RH” because the percentage of moisture in the air is relative to the air’s temperature. As the temperature gets higher, the air can hold more water, leading to the mugginess we feel in the summer. Warm temps and high humidity, prevalent in basements, also happen to be conditions that mold and pests love – making basements less than ideal for storing your family collections.
Another major environmental source of deterioration is exposure to light. This image is a striking example of light damage on dyed fabric – the protected area underneath the lapel is still fluorescent pink, while the exposed areas of the main garment have faded to a pale ballet pink.
All types of light cause damage, though the more UV rays in the light, the more damaging it is. Direct sunlight will cause the most damage the fastest, probably followed by fluorescent light. The least damaging option we currently have are LED lights.
The important thing to know about light damage is that it adds up over time and that the damage itself – fading, discoloration, and embrittlement – are irreversible. Once color has gone out of an item, there’s no getting it back.
We have great ways of mitigating light damage, though! A lot has to do with placing your materials in proper storage boxes (more on that later), or using UV-filtering glass in frames for the items you wish to display. Protecting your collections from light can be also be as simple as installing curtains and turning out the lights when a room is not being used.
In the next post, we’ll cover the second bullet point – the dirty aspects of the environment that cause damage: pollution, dust, debris, and clutter. See you there!
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