“The library was surrounded by books in beautiful gilt bindings. In the immense bay window was a large Louis Quatorze table, round which the ladies all placed themselves at their embroidery, though I preferred looking over curious illuminated missals”
The two libraries at Audley End house over 10,000 books, assembled by many generations of the Braybrooke, Neville and Cornwallis families. Visitors are always fascinated by the sheer number and the beautiful bindings. Often they can be seen peering at the spines to get an idea of the large variety of the subject matter.
As part of the ongoing conservation of the collections the books must be dusted and checked to make sure they are in good condition and in their right positions. This is a very time consuming process and in order to carry out the work in a reasonable timeframe a book cleaning machine was hired.
The machine was put into action and proved to be an efficient and gentle ‘worker’, ably assisted by the conservation team and several volunteers. These machines are purpose built and are in current use in many important libraries throughout the world. They enable a faster yet delicate brushing and vacuuming of the six faces of each volume and are used in conjunction with hand cleaning.
The majority of the books are in good condition and so were ideal for the machine, while those of a more fragile nature were cleaned by hand. Once the shelves were unlocked each book was taken down, checked and cleaned and then replaced in exactly the same position as it has been in for over 100 years. This chance to handle these precious volumes was a great privilege for those involved and it soon became clear that the library contained books of incredible rarity and great beauty.
The Friends kindly paid for the hire of the book cleaning machine for a third week. We were able to clean 3569 books over the three weeks. The project is ongoing and further sessions of hand cleaning will be arranged.
