Cataloguing

Accessioning

Before we catalogue an object, we accession it. In museums, this is the process by which an object officially becomes part of the museum's collection. Each object is allocated a unique number, called an Accession Number, which is then attached to the object.

Advantages of Accessioning:

• The Accession Number connects the physical object to its catalogue record and any related paperwork, so ensuring easy and organised retrieval of information.
• The attached number allows easy identification, and eliminates confusion between similar objects.

Our services include:

• Designing a numbering system to allocate each object a unique Accession Number.
• Creating an Accession Register that records basic information about each object, which can be printed and bound as a back-up catalogue. 
• Labelling or marking each object with its Accession Number, using an appropriate method for each type of object: markings are designed to be impossible to remove accidentally, but easy to remove if required, without causing any damage. 

Cataloguing

After it is accessioned, an object can then be catalogued. This is the process of recording information about the object onto a computer database.

• Museums used to use card catalogue systems (right) to record information about their objects, a bit like old library card catalogues...

• ...but now use computer databases (below) that can hold much more information, are easier to search and can include digital images.

Advantages of Cataloguing:

• Cataloguing makes  finding information about your objects much more efficient, and therefore makes your collections much more usable: museums use catalogues to help research for new exhibitions, for designing tours and programs, for answering enquiries etc.
• You can publish extracts from your catalogue on your website. Museums often do this as a form of advertising, showing people all over the world what interesting collections they have to encourage them to visit the museum. Follow these links to see some examples of online museum catalogues:

National Heritage Board,  Singapore

British Museum, UK

J Paul Getty Museum, USA

Museum Victoria, Australia

• You can quickly see what you have in your collections and where it is stored.
• Good cataloguing shows you are looking after your collections properly, helping you gain credibility with potential donors and funding bodies, as well as the general public.
• Catalogue records can contain condition reports that help you to monitor the condition of the objects in your collections.
• Computer databases can be backed up easily, and copies made for security.

• You can select entries from a list of approved and standardised terms to ensure data consistency and therefore ease of searching.

• You can also have fields where you can select multiple entries.

Our services include:

• Helping you chose a suitable database program: we are experienced with many database programs, ranging from museum-specialist programs to mainstream programs like Microsoft Access. We can also recommend options for Mac users, as well as free and 'open source' programs. 

• Designing your catalogue to suit your collections. You can have anything from basic records (accession number, description, digital image, storage location) to a complex system that records all the information you know about the object, including multiple images, hyperlinks, attached files etc. 

• And, of course, cataloguing each of your objects using the highest standards of accuracy and consistency to create an invaluable resource documenting your collections.

See Digitisation and Conservation and Storage for more details on what we can do.