Manuals

Basic techniques for care of paper materials

We show elementary techniques of paper materials (in English).

• Dry Cleaning with Brushes (PDF: 96KB)
• Dry Cleaning with Powder Eraser (PDF: 142KB)
• Cleaning Mold-Damaged Materials (PDF: 168KB)
• How to reattach a cover to a text block (PDF: 324KB)
• Simple Folding Case (PDF: 343KB)
• E-Learning "Conservation of Paper Materials: Minor Repair" (YouTube)

Conservation of paper materials: Minor repair

These are links to English translations of the texts used in our on-site training program for librarians in Japan as well as to video clips with English subtitles.

• Whole text including introductions to tools, starch paste and Japanese paper
  Text (PDF: 1.98MB) Video

1. Mending tears with overlapping edges Video
2. Mending tears with sharp cut edges Video
3. Mending tears passing through texts or illustrations Video
4. Repairing missing page corners Video
5. Hinging-in a detached page Video

Japanese bookbinding and how to handle Japanese-style library materials

These are English translations of the texts used in the Practical Workshop for Librarians on Early Japanese Books (FY2017).

• Japanese Four-Hole Book Binding (Yotsume Toji) (PDF: 683KB)
• How to Handle Japanese Bound Books and Chinese Classics (PDF: 167KB)
• How to Handle Handscrolls (PDF: 207KB)
• How to Handle Hanging Scrolls (PDF: 312KB)
• How to Handle Wooden Boxes (PDF: 199KB)

Disaster Preparedness

• Drying wet materials 1 (PDF: 367KB)
• Drying wet materials 2 (PDF: 308KB)

NOTICE: This is a simple manual for treating library materials in general based on the cases in the National Diet Library. When you treat rare books or severely damaged materials, we recommend you to consult expert in conservation treatment.

Preservation in libraries

This is an English translation of a text used in the training programs for librarians.

• Preservation in libraries (PDF: 304KB)

Protecting Our Books ―Tools for preservation and restoration

(1) Cutting and folding

This article is a translation of an article in Japanese from NDL Monthly Bulletin No. 723/724 (July/August, 2021).

(2) Applying paste and sticking

This article is a translation of an article in Japanese from NDL Monthly Bulletin No. 726 (October, 2021).

(3) Pressing

This article is a translation of an article in Japanese from NDL Monthly Bulletin No. 729 (January, 2022).

(4) Examining

This article is a translation of an article in Japanese from NDL Monthly Bulletin No. 732 (April, 2022).