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…