Repair and Stewardship: Collections Care Lab reports a banner year
An unheralded but essential office within VCU Libraries is the Collections Care Lab, which performs the vital duty of saving damaged books that would otherwise be lost from the collection.
Recent upgrades in equipment have improved the lab’s performance and scope of work. Additions include: ductless fume hood; suction table; humidification chamber, eyewash station; flammables cabinet; and a secure cabinet for rare Special Collections and Archives materials. The conservation work station at the Health Sciences Library was also upgraded.
These investments in equipment are wise. The average list price of a print book for Cabell Library is $101.81, according to information provided by a vendor. With discounts applied, the average cost of a book is $83 for Cabell Library and $150 for the Health Sciences Library. This price does not include the cost of staff time to process replacements or new books. Nor does it factor in the negative environmental impact of producing and shipping items that could simply be fixed rather than discarded or rebound.
When considering replacements of old or damaged books, some used books are available. But, many books and journals are irreplaceable. Costs can vary drastically, depending on the subject. For example, art and medical books cost much more than the average volume.
“Because of the age of most books in the Health Sciences Library, and the strong print collection in the arts, these are often books that require care due to their high cost, intrinsic value or scarcity,” says Collections Care Librarian and Conservator Nora Bloch. “Some items are irreplaceable and the only option for them to endure is to repair them.“
Book repair statistics are continuing to improve each year with 2023-24 being the Collection Care Lab’s most productive fiscal year ever.
- The lab diagnosed and treated 1,718 items consisting of 3,880 individual treatments. This is up from 777 items and 1,792 treatments the previous year.
- 86% of items treated are the only copy that VCU owns.
- 89% of books treated do not have a digital copy available.
- 15.5% of books treated are scarce, meaning there are fewer than 26 copies recorded in Worldcat, a global catalog of library materials.
- 68% of books treated are first editions.
- 75% of items took one hour or less to repair. 55% of books treated took under 30 minutes to repair, 19% took between 30 minutes to one hour, 17% took 1-2 hours, and 5.5% took 2-3 hours, and 1.5% took more than 4 hours to repair. (Items that that take more than 4 hours almost always consist of materials that are scarce, high value, difficult to replace or part of a retention obligation.)
Staffing for the Lab is lean. Bloch is assisted by a team of Collections Care technicians – one full-time professional and three to eight student interns who carry out book repairs for circulating collection.
Categories book repair, collections care, stewardship of assets