For a number of years, the problems associated with the deterioration of glass have been of concern to conservators at the Victoria and Albert Museum. Various condition surveys, together with the recent redisplay of the V&A's glass collection, have focused attention on the issue of glass stability. The collaborative research carried out by the Department of Materials at Imperial College has gone some way towards providing conservators with a greater understanding of the process of decay. As a result of the investigations, a number of useful recommendations has been made for the care and display of unstable glass. Approaches to the practical and preventitive conservation of such objects, by necessity, deviate from the standard methods normally adopted for stable glass vessels. Some practical treatments have been proposed.
