Lower East Side Tenement Museum Collection Plan

FAIN: PG-50930-10

Lower East Side Tenement Museum, Inc. (New York, NY 10002-3102)
Derya Golpinar (Project Director: May 2009 to October 2011)

Funding supports the development of storage plans for the museum's collections, which include clothing, household accessories, furniture, photographs, and architectural fragments from the tenement building at 97 Orchard Street and materials donated by former residents, shopkeepers, owners, and their descendants. The collections document life in Lower East Side tenement houses during the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

The Lower East Side Tenement Museum requests a grant of $5,320.00 from the National Endowment for the Humanities to support the creation of two detailed plans for the proper housing and storage of its object and architectural collections into secure, climate-controlled spaces. The majority of the Museum's objects are currently stored below ground level in a basement space at 91 Orchard Street, and nearly 1,775 objects are stored in the cellar of its building at 97 Orchard Street. The current storage conditions are substandard, and the collections are at risk. This project will ensure the collections' safety by supporting the creation of two storage plans to adapt newly available space into a secure storage room and to outline the proper storage and housing of large furniture and architectural fragments currently housed at 97 Orchard Street. Support from this grant will cover consultant costs and costs associated with consultant work.