Preparation Weeks - Worcestershire Library and History Centre

What we do

Worcestershire Record Office exists to preserve the county’s archives - the records that comprise the memory of the lives and experiences of the people who lived and worked in Worcestershire. We ensure that the records that need to be kept are looked after in the very best conditions so that they will survive and be available for future generations to research, learn from and enjoy.

Where we're going

The two current branches of the Record Office are to merge to form an important part of the brand new Worcester Library and History Centre, due to open to the public in Summer 2012. The Centre will include a fully-integrated public and university library, Worcestershire Historic Environment and Archaeology Service, as well as Worcestershire Hub Customer Service Centre. The Record Office alone will contain 8 miles of documentary archive dating from the 12th century to the modern day including manuscript, maps, photographs and audio-visual material. The public will be able to access 23,000 records of all the archaeological sites and historic buildings in the county.

Why we will be closing one week every month

A lot of work needs to be undertaken to prepare the office for this move in order to prepare us to meet the expectations of our researchers in the new building, yet maintain a quality service to our existing users in the meantime. This is why the decision was reached to close the County Hall branch of the Record Office for the first complete calendar week in each month from February 2010 to prepare for this new and exciting change. This is what we aim to achieve:

• To improve and widen public access to some of the many archive collections that are currently unknown and unavailable to Record Office users by preparing lists, catalogues and indexes.
• Increase on-line accessibility to information and services, including the development of the current finding aids indexes into a more user-friendly electronic format, which will be made available via the Record Office website for use in the branches but also by remote users.  
• Offer a much better service to those who deposit their records with the Record Office and who currently may have to wait many years for their valued collections to be listed and made available to the general public.

Further information about these closing times, as well as our regular opening times can be found on our Visiting the Record Office page.

Progress

To keep you up to date with our progress during our closure weeks, we will publish a monthly report about the work we undertake and the collections that we discover.

To see all of our reports so far, please check our Closure Week Information page.