Caring for Library Collections

Book Repair mends circulating materials and performs preventative treatments as needed for items added to the collections. Such repairs and treatments include hinge tightening, paper mends, tip-ins, pockets, full and partial repairs, re-casings, the making of in-house enclosures, and the reinforcement of some paperbacks. Recognizing the limitations of time and resources, books are selected and prioritized within the parameters established by the Libraries. About 8,000 treatments are performed each year.

Brittle Books generally come to Book Repair after circulating and cannot be repaired. Reformatting can be cost prohibitive. Currently decisions to keep or withdraw are made in concert with bibliographers. Book Repair makes in-house enclosures for retained brittle items.

Processing: Binding and Shelf Preparation With the growing availability of digital surrogates and a new journal binding policy (2008) the number of journals commercially bound has been reduced. Commercial book binding however stays at about the same level of 4,000 volumes yearly. With the reorganization of Cataloging, a new shelf-ready processing position has been added to the unit (July 2010).

Environmental Monitoring is currently performed in Special Collections and Archives by Special Collections staff. Preservation also is currently monitoring the West Campus storage area.

Helpful Links

ANSI/NISO/LBI Z39.78 2000 - Library Binding
Conservation Book Repair: A Training Manual (Alaska Historical Library)
Guide to the ANSI/NISO/LBI Z39.78 2000 - Library Binding Standard
IFLA Principles for the Care and Handling of Library Material
Repair and Enclosure Treatments Manual (IU Libraries Preservation)
Optimizing the Number of Copes for Print Preservation of Research Journals (UC, Berkeley)
Procedures and Treatments Used for Book Repair and Pamphlet Binding (UIUC)
Transitions in General Collections Conservation (Preservation: A weblog ... (UCLA)