Key details
Date of development: 2021
Who funded it: Doncaster Council
Case study themes
Service sustainability, community engagement, accessibility
Project summary
The new Doncaster Archives centre brings together the city’s archives and local studies collections. By refurbishing the old Doncaster Museum building, the city council has added an accessible research and storage facility in the city’s civic and cultural quarter. The public areas on the ground floor of the building include spaces for books and public computers with a glass-walled reading room.
There is a staff office and a strongroom with a range of different types of shelving to accommodate collections in various formats. The first floor provides storage space for the council’s retained records for Information Governance and supports local community groups such as the King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry Research facility and Doncaster Grammar School Rail storage gallery. The Danum Gallery Library and Museum sits in close proximity to the Archives site. Materials held in the archives building are used to refresh public exhibitions and support new displays.
Challenges and opportunities
The converted old school, which was the previous home of Doncaster Archives, was no longer fit for purpose. The building had severe structural issues including water ingress. As a result, mould was potentially damaging many collections. These poor storage facilities, along with other factors, were impacting the service’s attempts to become an Accredited Archive Service.
The archive and the local studies services were located five miles apart in separate areas of the city. This was problematic for visitors, who wanted to be able to access all the collections in one place.
All of the collections had to be stored offsite during the building project. This made it difficult to plan where items would be stored in the new strongroom. Most of the collections were stored at Deepstore records storage facility. The issue with mould meant some items had to be sent to Harwell Conservation Services for treatment and repair. Returning material to the new strongroom from two separate locations was complex.
Outcomes
The archives and local studies collections are now kept in proper storage conditions. Careful environmental monitoring of the strongroom is helping to ensure the preservation of valuable items. Archives such as large maps are stored on appropriate shelving which means they are easier to access and less likely to become damaged. Likewise, fragile formats such as glass plate negatives have been appropriately packaged and stored.
More of the collection is accessible than ever before. By bringing together archives and local studies, visitors can use whatever material best fits their research requirements. Archives and rare or fragile local studies stock is stored in the strongroom and consulted in the reading room along with microform materials. Computers with access to family history resources, as well as family history magazines, are in an open access area.
What did you learn from the process?
Although the glass walls of the reading room make the space more inviting, it is limited to six visitors and places must be booked in advance. Although the designated space is suitable for smaller groups there is an adjacent, large reception area, which can be used for talks, meetings and social gatherings.
Being a small team meant the project was challenging. For example, it wasn’t possible to create a locations guide at the same time as moving the collections. Although this is now being created, it impacts on the time available for other work, such as engagement activities or bid writing.
Moving to a new location has allowed the team to build wider relationships with colleagues from other areas of the Council and beyond. For example, the service collaborates with the neighbouring KOYLI Museum by organising open days for the public. The teams choose a theme and prepare family activities based around the collections. They also offer behind the scenes tours which have proved to be very popular.
Being in the same building as the records management team has allowed a partnership to develop. Previous archivists had responsibility for records management so the process of transferring material to archives was already established. However, this has become far simpler now that the archive strongroom is based on the ground floor. The two teams have started to discuss the wider issues of digital records retention for the council’s corporate archive as part of wider piece of work about digital resilience.
What is one piece of advice you would give others in a similar position?
Make sure that the widest range of partners are involved with the project planning. Collections staff can offer expertise about how the service operates which complements the expertise of the architect and builder. This combined knowledge should contribute to the planning and design of spaces.
For example, staff were aware of how intimidating the old building’s reading room was because nobody could see inside. They were able to make the case for the reading room in the new building to have glass walls. The architect understood why this was important and designed an open and inviting reading room. Visitors can see collections being used and this immediately improves their understanding of archives.
How will this work be developed in the future?
The service continues to work towards Archive Service Accreditation. Upgrading the strongrooms means that the team can focus on developing other areas before submitting their application.
For example, they have received a Resilience Grant from The National Archives to create a digital strategy and action plan. This creates an opportunity to work collaboratively with other council teams including IT and Governance. It will focus on developing digital solutions to make indexes, catalogues and image collections more accessible to the public. It will also help prioritise collections for digitisation and those in need of digital preservation. The archives facility will become in an integral part of opening the wider building to a variety of community based groups.
Find out more
Visit the City of Doncaster Archives website