Librarians Fold and Cut Their Way Through Box Making Workshop

The Frank Mt. Pleasant Special Collections and Archives is home to the rare and unique artifacts at Chapman University. Always pursuing the best way to take care of their materials, the library hosted a box making workshop last week. “This workshop was born out of interest and necessity,” said Stephanie George, Special Collections and Archives Librarian. Many of their archival items (i.e., artifacts, books) need specific enclosures and purchasing close-to-size or custom boxes can often be very expensive. “A good number of our artifacts were sitting on open shelves or wrapped and contained with other items.” Therefore, the Special Collections and Archives Librarians contacted Melanie Tran of the Homestead Museum after reading that she was teaching a clamshell and phase box class last February.

The workshop focused on constructing custom clamshell boxes, using the library’s own realia. Therefore, the workshop wasn’t only a demonstration, but also a hands-on workshop that resulted in at least ten custom boxes for Chapman artifacts. A private workshop, attendees included the Special Collections and Archives staff and six other Leatherby librarians.

The workshop was a large success and thanks to Tran, library artifacts will be able to live in happier individual homes.