National Art Library at the Victoria and Albert Museum

The first part of our tour was conducted by Assistant Librarian Frances Warren. This portion of the tour was not easy to follow, due to the speed and volume of Ms. Warren's speech. She also had a tendency to leap suddenly from one point to another; or perhaps it just seemed so, because I was missing a fair portion of what she said. She was very knowledgable about the library and its collection, but her inexperience with tours showed. Nevertheless, this is not a critique of her skills as a docent, rather an introduction to what is likely to be a somewhat disjointed blog entry.

The public areas of the library consist of two spacious rooms with upper galleries, the reading room and the 'center room'. The reading room is a space for silent study, and the center room is where visitors can register to use the library - Getting access to certain items actually requires references - make reference inquiries, request items, and make copies. For newer items, there are copy machines, but for older books there is a camera stand, which is a wonderful idea that many libraries could use! Patrons are also welcome to use their own cameras.

There area also three stories of closed access areas, for staff only. The first is called the Marshalling Area, where item requests are sent. Users fill out a request slip, which is put through a hatch, where a staff person takes it to find the item. Patrons must take an assigned seat number upon arrival, which is used on the request slip for bringing them their item. Interesting system.
Behind the Marshalling Area are the periodical stacks. The library has 8,000 periodicals, 2,000 of which are current, and the oldest of which date from Victorian times. Most of these are kept in hard copy, because they are used in museum displays. Most are also bound, but this is not being done as much recently both because of their desirability for displays and cost.
The second floor contains special collections in locked cabinets, for which staff keep approximately 20 sets of keys. These contain such items as medieval manuscripts, 15th- and 16th-centuries printing presses, and artists' correspondence.
The second floor also includes the staff areas, including the staff library - from which books can be taken home - Interlibrary loan services, cataloguing, and acquisitions. Items which are in process are retrievable, and can be catalogued quickly if someone requests them. The library's budget is very tight, and all donations of decent quality are accepted.
Exhibition and sales catalogues from the 18th-century on are kept on the third floor. In the past they were arranged by country, gallery, and year, but more recently by size, as space runs out. Ms. Warren pointed out the importance checking the press mark before going in search of an item.

The second part of our tour consisted of a small display presented by Librarian Jennie Farmer. This included samples of the types of books found in the collection, as well as examples of some of the conservation issues they encounter and how they have dealt with them, now and in the past. Amazingly, we were allowed to touch and photograph all of these items, even though some of them must have been incredibly rare, such as Jonathan Swift's own copies of Gulliver's Travel, and a proof of David Copperfield, with Charles Dickens' corrections and edits in the margins.
Some of the types of books represented were those on the history of the museum and library, such as Victorian catalogues of books on art; an early (1499) example of a printed book; catalogues; fashion books; Islamic bindings; and books that are art. Ms. Farmer noted with sadness that the many examples of Islamic bindings are both beautiful and sad, since the Victorian collectors did not value the contents of the books, only the bindings; as a result, the books were removed and only the bindings preserved.
In terms of conservation, only very valuable books, and those needed for museum displays are properly preserved by the conservationists. Otherwise, according to Ms. Farmer, the goal is to preserve the items in their current state, and keep them usable. Many techniques are used, including placing items in what is called a 'phase box' (because, theoretically, they are for phase 1 of the conservation process; in this case, that is their final phase), covering them with dust jackets, placing them in plastic sleeves or envelopes, and creating photocopied versions for use.

The aspect of this library collection that pleased and impressed me the most, is how committed the librarians are to keeping the items usable. It was amazing to be able to handle all of these items. Indescribable, really.