Cultural Property Package 2: Environment and Material Testing

Conservation decisions depend on the object, its materials, condition and environment. Cultural Property Package 2 focuses on environmental assessment and material test methods; it is not a general library of museum ethics, digitisation or emergency planning.

What the collection covers

The listed collection includes EN 15757 on temperature and relative humidity in relation to mechanical damage in organic hygroscopic materials, EN 15758 on temperature measurement and EN 16242 on humidity measurement.

Other listed documents address capillary water absorption, static contact angle, water-vapour permeability, colour measurement and water absorption by the pipe method. Their separate purposes matter: a result from one method cannot answer every question about an object's deterioration.

Choose a method from the conservation question

  1. Define the observed problem and the materials involved.
  2. Decide whether environmental monitoring, material testing or both are needed.
  3. Check the method's scope, specimen requirements and limitations.
  4. Record the equipment, conditions, location and procedure so later results can be compared meaningfully.

For an environmentally sensitive collection, this might begin with documenting conditions and changes over time. For a material investigation, the priority may instead be a carefully selected test that addresses a specific mechanism. Sampling or testing should be planned with the responsible conservation specialist.

What a package cannot decide

A collection of test methods does not prescribe one universal temperature or humidity target for every historic object. Nor does a test result by itself select a treatment. Interpret the findings alongside condition records, material knowledge and the conservation objectives.

Check the itemised contents and current publication status before buying; package contents and national editions can change.

Reviewed 26 September 2026.

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