Digitising the historical archives of the Conservation Centre at the Natural History Museum, London

Abstract

The Conservation Centre at the Natural History Museum in London (NHM) holds a collection of approximately 18,000 archival records and documents. These historical records, which include photographs, slides, X-rays, building plans, letters, press cuttings and field maps, provide a history of fieldwork, specimen treatments and the evolution of conservation and preparation methods at the museum. This paper details a six-month project that was carried out to digitise much of these collections, making them more accessible and easier to associate with specimen records on the museum collection management system and adding to a museum-wide drive to improve accessibility through digitisation.