Framing and displaying family documents

All light, visible and ultraviolet, fades, darkens and yellows paper and photographs, and the damage builds up and can't be undone. Dim light over a long time does as much harm as bright light over a short time. That makes the wall the hardest place to keep a family document, whether it's a marriage certificate, a deed, a letter or a child's drawing.

The safest choice

Display a copy and keep the original in a box. A color scan or color photocopy makes a good display copy.

Some things are so sensitive to light that it's best to avoid displaying the originals at all:

• Newsprint and other cheap, acidic paper
• Colored paper
• Writing in ballpoint or felt-tip pen
• Watercolors, pastels and colored pencil
• Color photographs, inkjet prints and hand-colored photos
• Blueprints and other copies of plans

Framing an original

• Glazing. Use glass or acrylic with ultraviolet filtering, especially if the room gets sunlight or fluorescent light. Acrylic holds a static charge, so use glass over pastels, charcoal and anything powdery or flaking.
• Mat board. Use mat board made of cotton rag or chemically purified pulp that is buffered or acid-free. For photographs, it should have passed the Photographic Activity Test.
• Space from the glass. Use a window mat or spacers so the glass never touches the document.
• Holding it in place. Hinge the document to the backing with Japanese paper hinges and wheat starch paste or methyl cellulose, or hold it with paper or plastic corners and no adhesive at all.

Where it hangs

• Keep it out of daylight. Daylight and fluorescent light carry more ultraviolet, which does more damage than visible light.
• Use lower-intensity lights, and turn them off when no one is in the room.
• Use shades on the windows to keep sunlight off the wall.

An annotated example

What to do next

For anything you'd hate to lose, frame a copy and box the original. If you hang an original, use UV-filtering glass or acrylic and an acid-free mat that keeps it off the glass, and hang it away from daylight and fluorescent light. Keeping family photos safe, on paper and on disk covers storing the originals.