How Graham's bookplates are stored

And so, when one thinks of a bookplate - you imagine it in its home, safe, at the front of a beautiful book. This is definately a safe place for it to live, but over the years the bookplate has become in itself just as special, and indeed valuable as its caretaker.

Bookplates became a popular item in themselves to collect, and so then were lifted from their present homes to be a single loose sheet of paper. In the Library, they have a particular way of storing these: first of all attached to a sheet of acid-free paper, then interleaved with acid-free cardboard to give some weight to the protective layer. These in turn are stored within robust, specially made acid-free boxes for the library.