Storing buttons can be tricky. You can’t put them with others into one ziplock bag because they will rub against each other. You can place them each in its own small ziplock bag but then the bags slide in the box and a single button is not easy to retrieve. Recently I stumbled upon a great button storage solution from the Museum of Jewish Heritage in New York:
Button storage at MJH
They published it on the twitter account of their registrars @MJHReg (sure worth a follow, great stuff and pics!) and I contacted them to ask if we were allowed to re-publish it on Registrar Trek. Associate Registrar Jennifer Roberts replied immediately and gave us the permission. She also sent additional pictures…
Building the button storage
…and explained how it was made:
“For this particular collection, our Preparator is making custom trays out of blue board and archival paper hinging tape that will stack inside a standard archival box. Making custom trays has allowed us to fit approx. 350 buttons per box while keeping the buttons stable and easily accessible. The buttons are arranged by size to help save space, and we are currently digitizing the collection so we will have reference images to help us locate individual buttons in the future.”
Isn’t it lovely? Got to try this…
This post is also available in French, translated by Marine Martineau and in Italian, translated by Mazia Loddo.
Very nice work. I have a question. Do you have some mechanism for lifting individual trays out of the box? Or do you perhaps use a drop-front box so you can slide them out?
Anne Lane
Mountain Heritage Center
Western Carolina University.
We considered tabs but as our preparator makes such strong and sturdy dividers between the buttons, we grab the dividers themselves at outer points, to lift the trays out. None of the trays are heavy and the dividers are really quite strong.
Erica Blumenfeld
Senior Registrar Museum of Jewish Heritage