What To Do When Your Book Feels Threatened
When it comes to protecting your books against the ravages of time, here’s what every book collector should know. Threats to books come in two forms: light and moisture. Whatever their design, every book storage and protection system is dealing with light and moisture. How does excessive light and moisture damage books? And how can you prevent this damage by the way you design your book storage? Let’s take a look at the answers to these questions and see if it’s possible to eliminate the risk of losing valuable books to the elements.
Too much light fades the pages of books. If the sun shines too bright for too long on the pages of a book, those pages will begin to fade. If left unchecked, this process could result in completely blank pages. At the very best, sunlight is hitting you in the pocketbook because it is reducing the possible future value of your collection.
Moisture is an equally dangerous threat. Too much moisture can cause pages to swell and curl up. Too much moisture can cause unsightly (and value-reducing) stains on the cover and pages. In some cases, books may begin to mildew and take on that characteristic smell that can’t be covered up.
The best defense against light and moisture is to keep it from ever reaching your books in the first place. In terms of light, this means positioning your bookshelves away from windows. Make sure that no direct sunlight reaches your bookshelves at any time during the day. If there is no place out of the glare of the sun, then you can add UV protection to your windows. Ultraviolet light is the true culprit that causes damage anyway.
The other threat to be neutralized is moisture. You may find this hard to believe, but catastrophic water damage, like a burst pipe or leaking roof, is actually not that common. What you need to be more concerned about is the creeping, insidious moisture that works its way into your books without being seen. The best way to counteract this is caulking and sealing your windows. If you can keep moisture and dirt out of the room entirely, it puts you in control.
Protecting your books either on shelves or in storage involves eliminating light and moisture. If you keep this mandate in mind, you can count on having a well-preserved book collection well into the future.