Stabilizing and Rehousing Material Culture Collections

FAIN: PZ-50092-07

Museum of New Mexico Foundation (Santa Fe, NM 87501-4326)
Louise Stiver (Project Director: October 2006 to December 2008)
Wanda Edwards (Project Director: December 2008 to August 2013)

The purchase and installation of compact storage furniture and supplies to rehouse and relocate 10,735 artifacts previously stored at the Palace of Governors building to the newly constructed New Mexico Museum of History.

The Museum of New Mexico Foundation seeks $601,449 on behalf of the Palace of the Governors to stabilize and rehouse 10,735 three-dimensional historic artifacts over a 3 1/2 year period. For 100 years the constraints of the historic Palace building complex have greatly compromised preservation and access to the History Collections. A 1992 CAP report recommended relocation to a new storage environment as the highest priority and rehousing using modern methods as the second priority for the 15,000-object History Collections. The first priority was completed in 2004 by relocating the collections in preparation for building the New Mexico History Museum (NMHM) adjacent to the Palace, which includes a 8,381 sf environmentally-sound storage vault for the Collections. The current off-site storage environment also compromises the collections and limits accessibility and, for these reasons, the 3-D collection is deemed the highest conservation and environmental improvement for the Palace.