Top award for student conservator

Erica Kotze, a paper conservation graduate currently working as an intern at the University's Book & Paper Conservation Studio, was recently named Student Conservator of the Year in the Pilgrim Trust Conservation Awards.

Erica Kotze from the Camberwell College, University of the Arts was awarded the title and £10,000 for conserving a Thai manuscript in the Oriental collection of the Wellcome Trust.

The concertina-format medical folding book, a Samut Thai Khao, or white Thai manuscript, is a medical treatise written in Thai script and illuminated with demons whose body markings relate to medical conditions and possible remedies. The book, folded into 57 pages of hand-made paper, measures over six metres when unfolded. It had suffered severe mould damage and some parts had been lost - leaving the document unusable.

Erica designed and constructed a mount board support in the same concertina format as the manuscript, allowing it to be opened and closed without causing further damage. She also consulted Buddhist monks and manuscript scholars to help translate and interpret the text.

Ylva Player-Dahnsjö, Head of the Book & Paper Conservation Studio said, "We chose Erica for this year's internship because of her enthusiasm and dedication as well as her excellent conservation skills. In her preamble to the presentation at the British Library, Liz Forgan OBE, the Chair of the Heritage Lottery Fund and of the Judging Panel paid particular tribute to these qualities among those shortlisted, and that is when I knew that it must be Erica who had won. All of us in the studio are thrilled and proud on her behalf."