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The UK’s most extensive Holocaust and Nazi era archive, holding over 70,000 books, 17,000 photographs and 2,000 document collections, replaced multiple disconnected systems with a single Soutron solution that connects library and archive management in one place.
The Wiener Holocaust Library needed more than a standard library management system. With vast, interrelated collections spanning books, photographs, documents and audio-visual materials, it required a flexible, configurable solution that could cross-reference records, manage photo metadata at scale and give both the public and scholars a single point of access online. Soutron delivered it.
The Wiener Holocaust Library hosts the most extensive collection of archives from the Holocaust and Nazi era in the UK. Since 1933, they have been collecting material related to the Holocaust and now house over 17,000 photographs, 70,000 books and 2,000 document collections.
Each day the library answers historical enquiries from scholars, researchers or members of the public who are seeking information about particular books, documents or photographs that reside within the Wiener Library’s collection.
“This is one of our greatest achievements to date.”
Jessica Green
Digital Curator
With their large collections and needs, the Wiener Library were unable to find a solution in the marketplace of current vendors to their library and archive management requirements.
They needed to be able to improve the capture of metadata, especially from their photo sources, into a flexible database system to ensure efficient and accurate retrieval of information.
The workflow for managing photos was also a challenge and needed to be transformed into a seamless process which would allow the library to manage the metadata and therefore as a result create a hierarchical structure of photo collections, making it easier for staff to pinpoint specific photographs.
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By working closely with the Wiener Library, Soutron was able to develop an innovative, flexible and configurable solution, one that incorporates relational attributes to make it easy to cross reference materials.
With the new collections catalog now live and accessible from the main Wiener Library website, users can find a single point of entry to the records (or descriptions) of thousands of books, pamphlets, documents, photographs, serials and audio-visual materials available online.
Kat Hübschmann, Head of Collections at the Wiener Library, says “It bridges the gap for both the public and scholars to access, it has made a big difference in how we manage our documents now that we are all connected and with a seamless flow from our site to the portal with end users not realizing just how amazing it is”.
“All controlled vocabulary is now in one place, maximizing consistency when cataloging and indexing. It’s a great advantage to having one system. Also, we only have to deal with one very lovely supplier, not having to coordinate different ones”.
Jessica Green, Digital Curator at the Wiener Library, goes on to add, “this is one of our greatest achievements to date”. referring to the Wiener Library and the new solution Soutron has provided them.
Soutron is already developing stage two with a request facility where users can book to view documents, which is beneficial both for the Wiener Library and their visitors.
To learn more about The Wiener Holocaust Library and its extensive collections, visit their website at:
www.wienerholocaustlibrary.org
To find out how you can migrate to a single cloud-based archive and library management system to support your organization, book a 20 minute discovery call with us today, see below.
“It bridges the gap for both the public and scholars to access.”
Kat Hübschmann
Head of Collections
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The first step is to learn more. Here's how we can answer your questions:
Yes. The Wiener Library had been running several separate systems to manage its library and archive collections and needed a single relational solution to replace them. Soutron developed a flexible, configurable platform that unified the management of books, photographs, documents and audio-visual materials in one system, with one controlled vocabulary and one supplier to work with.
Soutron built a hierarchical tree structure for the Wiener Library that allows staff to navigate photo collections and pinpoint specific photographs. The system captures and manages metadata from photo sources in a flexible database, ensuring accurate retrieval.
All controlled vocabulary is held in one place, keeping cataloging consistent across the entire collection.
Yes. The Wiener Library's collections catalog is accessible directly from its main website, with a seamless flow between the two that end users experience as a single system.
The search portal gives the public and scholars a single point of entry to search thousands of books, pamphlets, documents, photographs, serials and audio-visual materials online.
Yes. Following the launch of the Wiener Library's collections catalog, Soutron began developing an online document request / booking facility as stage two of the project.
This allows users to book in advance to view specific materials, benefiting both visitors planning research trips and library staff managing their collections and enquiry workload.
