Go Team Textiles!

Here is a public service announcement from the textiles team. Wimpole Wrapped has come to… well Wimpole and us here at team textiles want to extend this theme through to the New Year and donate a scrap of Tyvek for every curtain we personally wrap. Thank you for listening/reading.

That either put a smile on your face or wondered if I’ve hit the eggnog a bit too early! This is actually a joint collaboration between my blog and the relatively new conservation blog now set up at Wimpole. Of course as you know when I say joint collaboration I mean of course that I wrote both of them for the two blogs!

For the quick version and probably repeated text feel free to hop over to the conservation blog and to check out what else is occurring in the world of Wimpole follow the link supplied (http://wimpoleestatent.wordpress.com). I also realise upon reading through this post that there may be a bit of repetition from previous posts so I apologise in advance.

Anyway, on with the show so to speak. This week it was just Mary and I doing the textiles as Maggie had been taken ill.

First off were the lovely curtains in the Yellow Drawing Room as seen here (left). Although we were bagging these we had to do it slightly differently due to quality and type of material involved.

The task here was to create quite tall Tyvek bags to fully protect the curtains. When the bags were in place they extended from my head height (that’s a dizzy 6 foot 2 inches, and yes it does get cold up here!) reaching down to the floor.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. So you think bagging a curtain sounds easy? Put it this way, I was glad Mary was able to help me as it’s definitely a two person job! Something I came to realise that afternoon when I was making more bags on my own!

Here’s a different explanation to how we create the Tyvek bags (and also to save on double typing!).

Simply put (or as simple as I can make it) we cut a length of Tyvek and fold it in half. When the bag is in place the curtain sits in this fold with the rest of the Tyvek running up the back and front of the curtain. In between the folds of the curtain we place acid-free tissue sausages to pad out the folds to prevent possible creasing of the material.

See I wasn’t kidding when I wrote about sausages! Look at those little bangers!! From tissue paper (top) to sausages (bottom). By the way, see that carpet underneath? You’ll probably be seeing more of that in a future post!

With the sausages in place the two ends of the bag are then folded round and tucked into each other to fully enclose the curtain. A specially created drawstring at the top of the bag is pulled tight (but not too tight) to secure it in place.

Here’s another photo of the bag creation process and also to give you a bit more of an insight into how long this all takes!

As you can see the ‘specially created drawstring’ is a very cleverly tied piece of thin Tyvek. Or if you prefer, Tyvek strip. Oh and just so you know the whole “Tyvek doesn’t rip or tear” is a load of rubbish! There should be a caveat that includes tearing if strip is too thin. The number of times I was struggling to tie to ends together and have the damn thing rip on me!

The folded over edge is temporary as this is lets us cut slots in the Tyvek that has the drawstring running through it. I had already cut the slots in the photo though I admit it is difficult to see them. Maybe I should have sprayed them red or something to make them stand out!

Boom. So there you go, I think that just about covers home-made Tyvek bags. I promise no more explanations, well not of the bags anyway. Look forward to next post with my ten part explanation of paper clips and their many uses!

As you can see the curtains in the Yellow Drawing room are nicely bagged up and ready for the works. Come back soon and no doubt I’ll have a post on us taking everything down again!

With the Hall being wrapped up for Christmas this year it’s been a bit too and fro with the materials. I had to borrow the only remaining roll of Tyvek from the lovely volunteers wrapping all manner of things ready for the next two weekends!

So a big thank you goes to the ladies for keeping me out of mischief and managing to carry on with the curtains!

Unfortunately Mary was preoccupied with other jobs in the afternoon so I pushed on by myself. Moving clockwise from the entrance hall, which had already been spruced up by the house staff, eventually found me in the Long Gallery (I think! If I’m wrong you’re welcome to correct me).

One thing that was noticeable bagging the curtains that afternoon was the effect of light damage on the curtain material as seen in the photo below. I know that Julia is working on a side project to monitor the light levels in each room to see how it affects materials.

It may be difficult to see from the picture but there is a stark contrast between the lighter fabric on the edge to the true red of the material itself. Hopefully the results of the light survey will highlight the problems of light in a grand Hall like Wimpole.

Finally as a throw back to Halloween, I’ve encountered an anomaly in one of my photos that I took while in the Long Gallery. Now I’m not saying I’ve captured a ghost on film because I’m always sceptical of that sort of thing (though I am open minded to all possibilities), but on the other hand it’s not something that I can readily explain.

First glance and there’s nothing glaringly obvious, it appears to be an empty room. The odd thing I noticed was the odd shape on the left of the photo. I don’t remember anything in the room that would create that sort of image, plus bear in mind it’s approximately in the middle of the room.

I should also point out that I took the shot into a mirror so the image is also a reverse of the actual Long Gallery. I have fiddled with the contrast and brightness levels to bring out the picture (it was originally black with just the white of the column) but either than that no other enhancements.

I suppose that’s what I get for trying to be arty! Ghostbusters eat your heart out!! Seriously though, any suggestions of a mundane explanation would be welcome.

And on that spooky note, until next time…

Carpets & Curtains (Part Two): It's Curtains Jim But Not As We Know it!

Hello and welcome to the second half of another day in the Hall! I should also welcome you to a room not usually seen on the tours or when you visit Wimpole. This is known as the Bow Room, called as such because it’s a large curved room that looks out on to the south avenue.

As it’s not usually part of the Hall walk through as it were, the Bow Room is unfortunately not in as good of a condition as most of the other rooms. Despite this, the curtains still need looking after and conserving where we can.

With the wiring project affecting ALL rooms in the house it makes it the ideal opportunity to care for the rooms a little better. Hence, here we are in the Bow Room lifting curtains off the floor and protecting them from the inevitable dust that will be created from the works.

I’ve been refraining on using the term ‘bagging curtains’ or ‘bag the curtains’; I don’t know why but I feel it a bit uncertain and open to ribbing! But essentially that’s what we’re doing: Bagging curtains!

Anyway, enough with the japery. On a side note, I was a little disappointed that japery is an actual word! I thought I was inventing a whole new word ready for the next addition of the English Dictionary but no such luck. Hey, read my blog and learn new words!!

Ahem, cough… enough of that. Using a roll of Tyvek (yes that magical material that doesn’t tear! – Incidentally I actually tore it today so that’s Mary’s theory out the water!). Basically we cut a length that runs down one side and up the other with eyelets cut in the edges. Tape (fabric tape not the sticky kind) is then fed through the eyelets allowing us to create a drawstring so we can pull the ‘bag’ together.

What about the two open ends, you may ask? Well, we simply fold and wrap them around to enclose the curtain in the Tyvek and tie off with some more tape. For a Blue Peter example; here’s one we made earlier (right).

This is pretty much the same method we’ve been using for all the curtains that have been tied up. Of course the type of curtain material does affect how we wrap and conserve the curtains. Some material, such as silk, creases really easily so more care has to be taken. Often we’ll create sausages to slip in between the folds to pad out the material so it doesn’t crease.

I’ve also just realised I’ve slipped into ‘textile’ language! Obviously I don’t mean your usual pork and apple; the sausages are ones we make using acid-free tissue paper. I may have mentioned these in a previous post but basically you concertina the paper up into a length or ‘sausage’ for use in packing out textiles.

When we tie up the curtains (see; much better than saying bagging curtains!), the sausages are placed where we intend to fold the curtain up so they pad the fold without too much creasing. And you have no idea how much I had to rephrase this sentence so it had a lot less innuendo in it!

Incidentally I apologise for the quality of the photos; they serve a purpose but they aren’t great. The lighting was pretty poor and the camera struggled a bit to focus up. You get the picture anyway, haha! Boom Boom!! I can see Shane groaning already…

Here's one we tied earlier...

The bagged curtains are suspended from the rails above using a simple length of tape. Speaking of simple anyone recognise what movie this is from: “Easy, just use a simple strand of creeper!” Anyhoo, after that intermission; we thread the tape through the eyelets of the bag several times for added strength and loop the top end around, through or over any support we can find up above.

Easier said than done I can tell you as nine times out of ten there is a distinct lacking of upper rail support! That’s when tieback hooks and conveniently placed picture hooks come in handy. Finally we simply tie tape around the trussed up curtains to secure the bag. This is done loosely so we don’t put extra creases in the curtain material.

So there you have it, not a bad job done! Mary’s always more than happy with the job we do, especially as she can put us in a room and say do this or do that and Maggie and I crack on with it. Ya have to blow your own trumpet sometimes!

Until next time…

Carpets and Curtains (Part One)

“Do you know what you want? You don't know for sure…” This about what sums up what’s going through my head at the moment, thinking how to introduce the next post! The quote is of course lyrics from one of my favourite songs ‘God Gave Us Rock n’ Roll II’ by Kiss that I happen to be listening to as I begin this post.

Ok so my taste in music is probably not for everyone and even my old roommate Al, way back during my days at uni, couldn’t stand the band but over the years I’ve come to appreciate some of their most excellent songs. FYI in case you didn’t realise it’s also the end song to one of my favourite movies!! Not telling what it is but there are clues within these first two paragraphs for you puzzlers out there.

Anyway, on to the topic (bar) of interest. Just out of interest who remembers the topic bar? Can you still get them in shops still? Or did I just make that up…By the way I’m genuinely curious, I wasn’t setting up a conundrum for all you folks! For all you Simon Pegg fans out there (Paul!), did you know he advertised Topic bars back in 2002?

And since the next track is ‘Action’, I better stop digressing and like they say in Monty Python: “Get on with it!” Right after Masterchef…

Well, I’m back! Man, I seem to be stretching this post out a bit although it was worth the break. After a very long intro, this is another house post from a week or so back. Yes, I have a backlog of blog posts now!

It was another carpet rolling Monday morning and Maggie and I were in Mrs. Bambridge’s bedroom prepping to roll a fragile rug. Eager to work we had shot off ahead, thinking that Mary would be with us momentarily. Fortunately we were quite familiar by now in the rolling of carpets and rugs so soon we got stuck in to organising ourselves and our equipment.

First job was to shift the furniture around so we could get access to the rug. Fortunately Val was nearby to give us a little direction and a hand with some of the more fragile items.

Once clear and properly rotated we could get to work covering in acid-free tissue paper and rolling on to the tube. Naturally this is easier said than done as several times during rolling we had to backtrack and shift the rug or tube slightly so it’d roll on a bit more square. Hard stuff when the rug itself wasn’t made straight!

The other thing you have to remember is that as you roll you have to smooth the tissue paper in front to remove as many little creases and bumps as possible. Reason for this is that any crease or fold can affect the material of the rug or carpet when it’s rolled up on a tube, which can lead to degradation.

Being a thinner rug than the carpets we had rolled previously, made it easier to ruck up as we were rolling. Quite a few times we had to stop and even out the rug underneath before we could continue.

Eventually though we had it tightly rolled up on to the tube ready for the next stage: Tyvek.

As with previous, the whole bundle is wrapped again in Tyvek, that magical material that protects but doesn’t tear. It’s quite nifty stuff, much better than the cursed tissue paper that refuses to cut and tears at the slightest pull!

Val was still on hand to give us a hand (as seen in the photo opposite) and lift the package away from the public. Where was I you may ask? I was doing the important job of documenting the entire procedure for prosperity!

Only kidding, I was actually manoeuvring the odd bit of furniture to make it easier for the two girls to get the rug out of the way. I’m often diving around trying to take the odd snap while hard at work at the same time.

Final job was putting everything back where it came from! Feeling a little guilty for stopping Val from doing her usual jobs we tackled putting most things back ourselves, although now I think about it I think Val was there anyway!

I also have a greater appreciation for those little barriers that are put up to stop the punters wandering all over the place. I had no idea how tricky they are to get right (that’s the barriers by the way not the public!); you put one up and as you’re adjusting it the one before falls over! It took longer than necessary to finally get the room properly barriered off, phew!

Now where are those curtains…

Back in the Fields

Oooh, nice fence!

On Tuesday it was cloudy, threatening with rain and the boss was back from hols. Plus Shane and Jayne were in that day so it turned out to be quite a fun day! After the usual cuppa to start the day, we fixed ourselves the job for the day and we were off for pastures new. Old really, as we were continuing the park rail fencing we had started previously before we ran out of uprights. 

This had been started as a weekend project for the CNTV (that’s Cambridge National Trust Volunteers to you and me) and a kind of hospital job for us on a Tuesday… or as Shane says: “It takes teamwork to make the dream work!” More of Shane’s colourful phrases later! Of the first problem we encountered was a new one that had arisen the week before; a padlocked gate. To all those who are thinking ‘surely you have a key for that right?’ well ordinarily we would do. Unfortunately we weren’t counting on the farm to come and put a new lock on with the only key in their pocket so to speak.

OMG!!!

I think this about sums up what we all thought at the time! Credit to kyaangelwing on Buzznet for the cool graphic. We soon found out that it was done to prove a point because the buggy driver kept on leaving the gates open when they went up to the Hall. Apparently it was because if the animals got into the stable block area, they could wander on to the front lawn.

You would have thought they’d make it easy for themselves and used the pedestrian gate that’s always left wide open anyway. I think there was great consternation from many of the departments and not just us lowly foresters! Rant over, phew I don't usually write something this controversial. I guess it was the hot topic of the day (Thursday), besides I had to write something to justify the cat with the Uzi! (Or whatever it is).

Starter kit; instructions not included

Okay, back to sanity once again. So, you ask, how do you erect that most stupendous marvelously looking fencing that could stop a herd of moose? Even better question: Do moose come in herds? Answers on a postcard, please! Well it all starts as a flat pack in a way, as we pick up the metal from the local engineering firm (Andy Klose Engineering) all ready protected and finished in black.

Actually the black finish is a new addition because we thought it’d speed up the job so Andy sends it off to be powder coated now. In fact it’s a very new improvement since you can see some unpainted uprights from the last lot of fencing in some of the photos!

Stop posing Shane and HIT IT!

First job is knocking in the uprights. There is a line strung out on the ground, with white poles as markers so we know where we’re going. You may be able to see the orange string in some of the photos.

Of course even with a line to follow it’s very difficult to get the posts spot on and dead straight all the way down as you’re thumping them.

It is possible to knock them in on your own (like Shane is doing), but bear in mind that the thumper itself is a heavy piece of equipment! Shane and I find it more efficient to use it together, with Jayne providing accurate levelling measurements every now and then.

 

Gently Does it...

Not forgetting of course to make sure we have the post in the right way round! Something we have all done at one point or another! On the odd occasion when we’re threading the bars though and suddenly realise the slots are in the wrong place!!

If that ever happens it’s down to the post-puller to get us out of a jam. That’s the post-puller Mark II by the way as the previous one is still lost in the woods somewhere (or was it stolen? I forget now).

Despite careful measurements it’s amazing how wonky the fence looks sometimes! Whether it’s because we put in the far (double slotted) post in first or not I don’t know.

With the double in, we then work back to the last completed section. Depending on the number of adjustments of course, it can be quite quick or really slow!

Level in hand, it’s a team effort to make sure the post is knocked in relatively straight. Fine-tuning can often be done later with a bit of extra pulling (or in desperate cases, the front end of the land rover!).

 

Usually with comments like: ‘left a bit’; ‘to you…’ and so forth. Or if you’re really lucky you’ll get a classic Shane: “A blind man would love to see that”!

Step two, with the posts in and nicely straightened up one way or another it’s now for the fun part and slide in the slats. Naturally if the posts are properly lined up and on the same slope, the slates will slide straight in with little effort. Coining another phrase, “Hole in one”; basically when you push it along and the slat fits straight into the slot first time!

I Love it When a Plan Comes Together!

Bingo! Peasy as pie!! Slats in and everything nicely lined up and it’s on to the next section. Rinse and repeat as it were. It’s nice to do the fencing because as we put it up you can look back and see your progress, to see how far you come in a few hours!

As a special bonus, here’s a little caption competition to finish! Enjoy and until next time…

 

 

On a Roll

Well since I keep forgetting to bring my camera when I’m doing forestry, I thought I’d post another from my day a week doing textiles. It was two weeks ago, so it’s going to be a bit of a drag on the old memory but I’ll do my best! I find a few photos usually help with that. Just on a side note for all those folks who live in the UK, Don’t forget up on all the action from behind the scenes at the National Trust currently being shown weekly on ITV. I haven’t appeared on the programme yet (except for a few background shots with my fellow co-workers) but I am sure we all will at some point!

Anyway, back to the point… this post is us working on one of the carpets that run down the back stairs. So if you’re afraid of heights look away now! Ok, this is looking up but you get the idea.

So you might think taking up a stretch of carpet is a relatively simple task. Well I thought that too until I actually started doing it!

The one on the John Soan stairs is perhaps not as important as some of the other rugs and carpets seen throughout the Hall but it still requires the same amount of attention and care when rolling it up.

First job is to unhook the stair rods that hold the carpet in place without causing a trip hazard. Yes, I know me and a flight of stairs with trip hazards is a little problematic I admit!

Still after a little bending and deft finger work (those rods were quite tight!) we had them out in no time.   

Following inspection of the carpet and seeing how many sections we would be lifting (or rolling) it in, we had to separate each one out. Then we hit a problem. The section I was sorting out was a little trickier than the others (It's always me that gets the difficult stuff!). The darn thing would just not come up and I didn't want to yank it too hard in case I ripped it. On closer inspection, literally millimetres from the carpet, I could just about see a tack.

Having called Mary over to get her opinion, the next few minutes we of us struggling to find even an edge to the tacks so we could get a grip on it. Even with a screwdriver we had very little luck so unfortunately in the end we had no option but to pull the tack through the carpet. Definitely not a recommended conservation technique!

Also not the way to secure a carpet in the first place. Even worse was when we finally got it up, we found that it was tacked into lead sockets to hold it into the concrete!

What the... ?!

With the carpet separated into three distinct sections it was down to the simple task of rolling up each section. We lifted these one at a time up on to the top landing so we could roll them up, placing the first two together to save on materials.

A quick vacuum and clean before hand was adequate for this set of carpets, and they were quite dirty! Almost as if a forester regularly used them perhaps... (sorry boss). Now nicely spruced up a layer of acid free tissue paper was rolled out on top of the carpet to protect it as rolled up.

Mind that banister rail!

Now as you can see, the corridor is only just wide enough to roll the carpet! Maggie did a sterling job rolling the first section up while I was snapping photos! Still I did my bit too, wait until you see the magnificent job we did on the curtains.

For those of you thinking of rolling your own carpets, remember to roll with the carpet and not against it. If you stroke the carpet you can actually feel how rough it is when you move your hand across in a particular direction. Oh and don't forget to turn the rug or carpet over before you roll!

Both the top landing section and the first stair section were rolled up in this way, the only exception being that when we came to roll the next section we lifted the rolled up landing piece on top so they rolled together (Maggie, correct me if I remembered incorrectly).

So what's the next step? Wrapping the sausages in Tyvek of course! As you can see (below) we take careful measurement of the object we're going to wrap and cutting it precisely to size. Or if you want that translated, roll out a length of tyvek, place said sausage in the middle and run the scissors down the length and pray you haven't just cut yourself just short!

Carpet sausages!

There; two nicely parcelled up carpet sausages. By the way, no string or sellotape was used in this production. It's amazing when you enter the world of conservation the sorts of things that can affect fragile textiles and upholstery, anything from ply-board to glues and other nasties. That's why we only use cotton tape to secure carpets, curtains and other fragibles. I just made that word up on the spot! Pretty neat... huh? If your wondering, it means more than one fragile item.

Apart from the underlay, which we rolled up into itself (no paper needed this time) and stacked all the individual steps, the only thing left was to protect the brackets for the stair rods. This involved cutting little squares (or rectangles if you want to be pedantic!) and tying them on each and every one. Although a little daunting at first, it didn't take as long as we originally thought, which was a good thing!

Underlay, Underlay!

Oh and more vacuuming! Not bad for a days work eh? Now where are those curtains...

For those of you who aren't afraid of heights (or drops in my case), here's a bonus photo! Until next time...

Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

 

A Change of Pace

We’re well into September now and the signs of autumn are sneaking in slowly, which means the winter season in the forestry department is almost upon us. More forestry news next time but this post focuses on my new voluntary role in the Hall.

A large scale project is underway to update all the wiring in Wimpole Hall itself and generally smarten that side of the maintenance up (i.e. do away with spare and loose wires that doesn’t go anywhere). Yes no more will you flick a switch, look around blankly and wonder what the heck that was supposed to turn on!

Of course this involves taking up the flooring in pretty much every room in the House, and there are a lot of them in there believe me! This obviously means that anything in the rooms needs to be protected either in situ or stored away while the work is being undertaken.

Thinking this would be a good opportunity to expand my skills a bit and edge into the conservation side of archaeology, I put my name down to help out. With the project being broken down into several different voluntary roles, I picked two to add to my already busy schedule.

What a View! Hey, who put that window in the way?!

So now I am on the textiles team (TT), a small group of us that are involved in conserving items such as curtains and carpets. This also includes everything textile related such as lamp shades, napkins, cushions etc, you get the idea.

The first official day for the TT was last Wednesday and we were up in the attics organising the archive room. This basically concerned unloading a rack filled with boxes of textiles that had been archived previously.

Sounds simple enough? Well there were a lot of boxes and they just kept on coming! There also came the problem of where the heck do you put these while we move the racking around. The small room next door sucked up some of the boxes in no time at all so we were forced to expand out in the corridor! When that space got short we had to extend further down the corridor past a fragile kneeler (more on that later).

With everything off and nicely stacked nearby it was time to move the racking…but wait, all that moving is thirsty work! A tea-break in hand later and we were back on the job.

Even with an empty rack it was still heavy, so next the shelving was coming out! Eventually it was movable so we rotated 90 degrees parallel with the other racking. We suddenly realised that taking a photo of the job before hand might have been a good idea as everything now had to go back on the correct shelves. Even though there was a print-out of what was on each shelf it wasn’t up to date!

Nevertheless we ultimately succeeded in restoring the shelves to their (kind of) original state. With a bit more manoeuvring with some other tables and objects it was pretty much job done!

Deciding it was time for lunch we made our way through the House. I took the opportunity to take some snaps before leaving the area…nice view from that high up! The afternoon would be a much more conservation-angled affair…

Maggie, Mary and Meta

That's only half of it!

…namely boxing up a church kneeler that Olga had stored in the attic in the past. Now this kneeler is no small item, it’s a good 6 – 8 metres in length and easily takes up most of the corridor it’s been resting in!

First job; an in depth inspection to look for any bugs and beasties that might be residing (or munching through) on or in the kneeler. Powerful lamps were used as the corridor was pretty gloomy even with the overhead light bulb on! On hands and knees we scoured every inch of the material, finding the odd evidence of insect life (discarded wing cases) but on the whole it seemed quite clear.

The next comedy moment came when we had to roll out the acid free paper. In a tight corridor with not a great deal of space this quickly became a tricky job especially trying to straddle, lift and move the paper all at the same time! And that’s with three people!! No there wasn’t any photos of that either; I’m not superman you know!

Anyhoo, with that little struggle nicely conquered it was down to the gallery to cut and score some sheets of Borex (I think that was it, I’m pretty sure it was very similar to Botox). We may also have had a cuppa about then too. Basically it’s a corrugated composite sandwiched between two outer layers of the same stuff; sturdy too.

Back up to the kneeler and it was just a case of sliding the sheets underneath and taping them up along the open seams, presto! A job well done and just the first of a vast number of objects to conserve… the adventure begins.

Oh by the way, you have no idea how hard it was trying to type conservation and accidentally writing conversation by mistake! We certainly did a lot of conversation that day!!