Shelves in the TRC Library.At the moment I am writing this, we have a library at TRC consisting of 6282 books. This is not including the books from new donations that have come in and are yet to be registered, or the immense magazine collection we still have in the depot; we are getting these ready to be registered.
Since December 2022 I have been the librarian of the Textile Research Centre. My main focus has since then been to get through the backlog of the hundreds of books that are donated yearly.
Every Monday I spend most of my time cataloguing new books and placing them in the library. In 2024 I have managed to get through most of the backlog and started putting away the newer donations. In 2024 this amounted to some 1200 books.
Besides registering the backlog and new books, I have also spent my time in 2024 on researching how to restore books, mainly torn pages or loosened spines. The reason for this is that during the course of 2024, we have received a considerable number of books from the mid- and late 1800s. Most have been in excellent state, but some have seen their fair amount of use. Since it’s unlikely that we will receive duplicates of these books.
Shelves in the TRC Library.
it seemed worthwhile to see how to repair these enough so that they can endure the shelves. The longest restoration project has been Hottenroth's Deutsche Volkstrachten Vol. 2, from 1900. We have had volumes 1 and 3 in the library for some time. So when I found the second part in a box of recent donations I knew we had to have it repaired. Most of the pages were damaged.
New addition to the TRC Library: A damaged copy of Hottenoth's Deutsche Volkstrachten, Vol. 2 (1900).
Besides the restoration, some other projects in the library are: Setting up the magazine library; Setting up the DMC library; Setting up the patterns and charts library.
These are yet to be made available, but since the arrival of a second librarian in December we’ve been working at a much faster pace than before. The day before Christmas I asked a couple of volunteers outside of the TRC to help reorganizing the entire library. One of these was Bjarne Lubbers, who joined as my assistant at the beginning of 2025.
Sticker for crochet thread ball.After just a month he has become the second librarian. With the help of Bjarne we’ve had more time available to digitalise the system, been able to locate missing books and actually set up a system to do the actual hands-on work of librarians. The plan for 2025 is to have the new sections (‘libaries’) up and running so that we also have more time to possibly do research ourselves and optimize the library system.
As for the main textile and dress collection, besides our own interests in crafts and supplying books for research and exhibitions, we aren’t really involved. However, I do have some personal favourites in the collections. For example the stickers from crochet thread balls. The reason I specifically like these, is that it combines several interests of mine. The crochet thread, the Renaissance artist Albrecht Dürer, and the reference to the artist in metal music (Serenity – Nemesis AD !).
For the TRC Library online catalogue, click here.
Roos Groen, Librarian TRC, 15 April 2025
