Custom Museum Storage Cabinets

The biggest challenge in planning a collections area is usually dealing with future uncertainty: How will collections grow over time? Could collecting priorities shift in a few years? Will we ever get more room to expand collections storage?

Staff at the Frazier Museum in Louisville, Kentucky, faced some of those questions as well.

A Cramped Collections Area

Housed in a former tobacco warehouse that was built in 1898, the Frazier Museum has shifted focus over the past couple of decades. As a result, its collecting priorities and its collections have changed.

What hasn’t changed are the architectural constraints in the museum’s collections storage area. Large structural columns break up the space. Ductwork drops down from the low ceiling. In the past, inefficient static shelving filled the area. Staff knew something needed to be done to improve the space and add capacity, while still maintaining convenient access to all the objects in the collection.

Custom Museum Storage Cabinets Optimize Space

To optimize space throughout the collections area, museum staff worked with the local Spacesaver consultant to design cabinets, art racks, and a high-density mobile system that work around the basement’s space limitations.

Designed for Future Flexibility

The new collections equipment is a vast improvement over the cramped shelving that previously filled the space. Every object in the collection now has a home, and staff also have room to store shipping and conservation supplies right where they’re needed.

Best of all, the room provides future flexibility. With reconfigurable cabinets and room to add new cabinets and shelving as the collection grows, the museum will be able to pursue its mission for years to come.