Handling Heritage Objects. Moving the Entire Pharmaceutical Collection within the National Museum of Transylvanian History
Handling Heritage Objects. Moving the Entire Pharmaceutical Collection within the National Museum of Transylvanian History

Summary/Abstract: Starting with 2018, the building previously housing the History of Pharmacy Collection (a privately owned building), known as the Pharmacy Museum, underwent massive restoration. The building, also known as the Hintz House, has traditionally been housing the exhibition of pharmaceutical objects – a collection owned by the National Museum of Transylvanian History. When the building was set to be restored, the collection, which then counted around 2400 inventory numbers, was packed and moved to the headquarters of the museum in the central storage facility, where it remained until 2023. The newly reorganized permanent exhibition at the Hintz House is set to be re‑opened in early 2024. The logistics of such an activity was complicated, as it was the first complex transfer of an extensive collection that the museum had organized in the last decades. The entire collection was assessed before moving, from a conservation point of view, to establish if any objects require specific handling, along with materials and equipment for their manipulation. The collection’s relocation was intended to last for a few years; during this time, most of the cultural objects were planned to remain packed and temporarily stored since the collection needed to be moved back to Hintz House once the renovation was completed. The museum staff did the packing under the strict supervision of conservators and restorers, and a moving company specializing in art handling was hired to transport the collection to the museum headquarters.

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