Quipus are now Preserved Using Techniques that will Minimise Their Future Degradation

Love Embroidery Digitizing

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Museums, archives and special collections have adopted preservation guidelines from textile practices.

Quipus are made of fibers, either spun and plied thread such as wool or hair from alpaca, llama, guanaco or vicuña, though are also commonly made of cellulose like cotton.

The knotted strings of quipus were often made with an "elaborate system of knotted cords, dyed in various colors, the significance of which was known to the magistrates".

Fading of color, natural or dyed, cannot be reversed, and may indicate further damage to the fibers.

Colors can darken if attacked by dust or by certain dyes and mordants.

Quipus have been found with adornments, such as animal shells, attached to the cords, and these non-textile materials may require additional preservation measures.

In the mid 1990s a team of MIT researchers led by Steve Mann, Thad Starner, and Sandy Pentland began to develop what they termed wearable computers.

These devices consisted of traditional computer hardware embroidery digitizing attached to and carried on the body.

In response to technical, social, and design digitizing challenges faced by these researchers, another group at MIT, that included Maggie Orth and Rehmi Post, began to explore how such devices might be more gracefully integrated into clothing and other soft substrates.

The study of the history of clothing and textiles traces the availability and use of textiles and other materials and the development of technology for the making of clothing over human history.

The wearing of clothing is exclusively a human characteristic and is a feature of most human societies.

It is not known when humans began wearing clothes but anthropologistsbelieve that animal skins and vegetation were adapted into coverings as protection from cold, heat and rain, especially as humans migrated to new climates; and an alternative hypothesis is that covering may have been first used for other purposes, such as magic, decoration, cult, or prestige, and later found to be practical as well.

Clothing and textiles have been important in human history and reflects the materials available to a civilization as well as the technologies that had been mastered.

The social significance of the finished product reflects their culture.