Collections

The Old Sydney Society Collections are focused on the history of Sydney and surrounding areas, in fact, most of the objects have been donated over the years by members of the community!

All of the objects at the Old Sydney Society are housed in one of our three different storage rooms: the collections room for general items, the archive room for photographs and documents, and the clothing room for textiles. Humidity, temperature, and exposure to light are all controlled for the continued preservation of the objects.

Each item in the collection is tagged, and those tags are cross-referenced with paper files containing all the relevant information (where it came from and who it may have belonged to, etc.), The numbers are also uploaded to a Nova Scotia Museum database that includes information about all of the items in all of the collection of museums and historic sites across the province. The database is cross-referenced to show where it is physically located in the collections room.

This means that workers in museums across Nova Scotia can see what objects other museums have, and allows us to have conversations about sharing or borrowing objects. It also allows the public a glimpse into collection rooms across the province with the NovaMuse website!