Sophie Rowe

Sophie Rowe ACR is the Head of Conservation, managing all aspects of the conservation and collections care programmes in the Fitzwilliam Museum since 2021. She is an Accredited conservator with over 25 years experience as an organic artefact specialist, previously working at the British Museum, the National Museum of Denmark, and for university museums including the Polar Museum, Cambridge and the University of Cambridge Museums consortium. She holds a BA(Hons) from the University of Cambridge and a MSc(Distinction) in Conservation for Archaeology and Museums from University College London. She has been a Museum Accreditation mentor for Arts Council England since 2018 and has been Vice Chair of the board of trustees for Icon Institute for Conservation since 2019.

Sophie's research interests include conservation of Ancient Egyptian organic artefacts, the use of mounting methods to minimise the need for intrusive conservation treatments, and conservation of challenging modern materials, including plastics.

Publications

S Rowe, 2023 (editor) Plastics in Peril: focus on conservation of polymeric materials in cultural heritage. Proceedings of a conference jointly hosted by University of Cambridge Museums and the Leibniz Association or Research Museums, Germany 16-19^th November 2020 https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.104113

S. Rowe, 2018 Managing small radioactive collections in the UK: experiences from the Polar Museum, Cambridge. Journal of Conservation and Museum Studies 16(1) http://doi.org/10.5334/jcms.166

S. Rowe, 2018 Second fiddle: a review of lesser known volatile binding media in conservation. In post prints of the conference ‘Subliming surfaces: the use of volatile binding media in heritage conservation’, April 2015. Cambridge. https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.49280

S. Rowe, F. Ravaioli, C. Tully and M. Narvey, 2018. Conservation and Analysis on a Shoestring: Displaying Gut Parkas at the Polar Museum, Cambridge. Journal of Conservation and Museum Studies. 16(1) http://doi.org/10.5334/jcms.157

S. Rowe, 2017. On the provenance of a historic sledge shoe fragment, said to have been collected by Edward Wilson at the South Pole in 1912. Polar Record, v. 53, p.413-426 https://doi.org/10.1017/S0032247417000365

S. Rowe, J. Dawson, 2014 ‘Mummy case saved by LEGO’: a collaborative approach to the conservation of an Egyptian cartonnage. Presented at the conference ‘Understanding Egyptian Collections’ Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, September 2014. Available as a podcast at: http://staged.podcasts.ox.ac.uk/mummy-case-saved-lego-collaborative-approach-conservation-ancient-egyptian-cartonnage

S. Rowe, R. Siddall and R. Stacey, 2010 Technology and conservation of a gilded cartonnage mummy mask from Hawara. In: Dawson, J, Rozeik, C and Wright, M. (eds) ‘Decorated surfaces on Ancient Egyptian Artefacts: technology, deterioration and conservation’, Proceedings of the meeting of the ICON Archaeology Group, September 2007. London: Archetype

S. Rowe and C. Rozeik, 2008, The uses of cyclododecane in conservation. Reviews in Conservation, Vol.9, pp17-32

S. Rowe, 2004: The effect of insect fumigation by anoxia on textiles dyed with Prussian Blue. Studies in Conservation Vol. 49, pp259-70

Sophie Rowe

Publications

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