The Vasa experience with polyethylene glycol: A conservator's perspective

It is now fifty years since the raising of the Swedish warship Vasa, one of the first wooden shipwrecks and certainly the largest to have been conserved with polyethylene glycol (PEG). Now a standard material for waterlogged wood conservation, PEG has since been used on a number of other shipwrecks, thanks largely to the Vasa experience. As the second generation of conservators at the Vasa Museum in Stockholm, we are often asked our opinions about PEG, and whether we would still use the same materials and techniques should another ship like Vasa be raised today. What have we learnt and what would we do differently this time? In this paper, we examine the Vasa experience from the initial conservation decisions, through to the most recent research projects and examine how PEG has fared over the last fifty years. Finally, we take the lessons learned and apply them to the future, both for Vasa material and for newly found wrecks.