Advice on preservation please!

This trunk has a remnant of a paper tag on it bearing my great grandmother’s maiden name, and another tag from roughly the time of WWI I’m interested in preserving. Any advice on how to accomplish this is much appreciated.

Also curious as to approximate age of the trunk.

 

I think what you've done by photographing the labels is preservation. The paper won't stop degrading, but you could have your 2 pictures printed out in color on photographic paper at an office store, and keep them in a baggie in the bottom of the trunk.

 

You could laminate it but you would have to remove it. I have seen pieces with clear tape adhesive over meant to secure the paper label but at the same time, it protected the label. Not sure if it was a special type of tape?

 

Ooo, great idea! Thank you!

 

I think you may be right about the special type of tape. I vaguely recall hearing about people spraying or carefully painting on some sort of preservative, but I will definitely have to do some research.

 

I have put polyurethane over crate labels when I was refinishing the crate. Often the labels were loose and incomplete and would have fallen off if not coated. Many would object, but boxes I did 40 years ago are still looking good and the labels were preserved.

 

Maybe contact a museum . . . a conservation expert should be able to provide advice.

 

The trunk itself looks turn-of-the-century, and if only valuable to you because of the labels, I guess you could carefully steam the labels loose and keep them from harms way. Central heating will cook them, if you take the trunk in the house as is.

 

Don’t use tape under any circumstances, that will destroy in a couple decades, and I wouldn’t spray anything on it for the same reason. Removal and kept in acid free plastic envelope would be best, but seeing it has kept for 100 years as it is now, just leaving in place for the next few decades would be the easiest.