Box clever: Inside our innovative boxing workshop

You might imagine the National Library’s shelves and stacks lined with thousands of books. The reality is less colourful and more, well… grey.

This is because much of our collections are carefully stored in boxes to ensure their longevity. These boxes are practical tools for handling and transporting items to our reading rooms. They also provide essential protection against environmental threats like dust, mould, light, and temperature changes. The boxes are our first line of defence in the event of a flood, keeping our collections safe and dry.

We create these protective boxes on a large scale at our in-house box-making workshop.

The die-cutting machine produces 300 standard-sized boxes per hour! The table-cutting machines are used for bespoke sizes, so we can quickly respond to the needs of our collection. The process is streamlined and precise, with custom-sized boxes ready in about two minutes.

We box all new paperbacks as soon as they arrive and are looking to extend this to hardbacks too. Historic books and other significant acquisitions are boxed immediately as well.

The real challenge lies in boxing the older items in our collection that pre-date our boxing methods. We’re addressing this by creating custom-sized 'phase boxes' for each collection, one at a time.

Recognising the need to conserve space and speed up the boxing process, we’ve developed new styles of boxes that are more space efficient.

Our 'cabinet box', 'side-on box' and 'side-on boat' are designed for different types of collections. The side-on box, for example, is ideal for small, uniformly sized books. This allows us to box them in batches and save a significant amount of space.

Since these boxing methods have proven successful, we’re implementing them across suitable collections. Their effectiveness has even sparked interest outside the Library, with external customers seeking our boxes for their own collections. Find out more about our box-making service.

This approach is all part of our ongoing commitment to preserving the integrity of our collections for future generations.