Winterthur Museum, Garden & Library

The Winterthur Museum will treat approximately 500 of its most vulnerable silver and silver alloy objects, by removing failed lacquer coatings applied before 1990. The project will enable the museum to continue research related to silver surface corrosion and to start new research on corrosion and coating issues for its copper alloy collection. Successful project completion insures the preservation of the museum's silver collection while on view and in study settings, meeting the museum's mission to educate general audiences in techniques and best practices of care without compromising collection safety. Through presentations of analytical information, staff will contribute new findings, recommendations, and cautions in lacquer-coating metals, and will also publish and present to the international conservation community quantifiable results from nearly 30 years of lacquer coating practices and analytical research.