Paulownia storage boxes

I was wondering if anyone would be willing to share their opinion
about storing antique Chinese scroll paintings in paulownia/pawlonia
wood boxes. Would you recommend this material as safe for scroll
paintings? I am not familiar with the material and have understood
that generally, wood products are acid and tend to off gas yet this
wood is traditionally used to store scroll paintings.

I work at a small private art Chinese art museum that stores it's
paintings in these boxes and I want to make sure it is safe to
continue using the paulownia boxes. Our paintings are usually
wrapped in a synthetic fabric that looks like rayon and then placed
in the paulownia boxes. The Taiwanese company that manufactures
these boxes also includes a small strip of insect repellant that is
in a small paper packet and then wrapped in a Japanese rice paper. I
have no information about the repellant because everything is in
Japanese (unfortunately, I don't speak Japanese or Chinese--yet). I
also worry that the repellant could be damaging to the artworks. The
odor from the repellant is very strong and from what I understand it
is packaged specifically to place in the paulownia boxes to protect
the scrolls.

If anyone has any information they can share with me about paulownia
wood or about pesticides/repellents next to art work I would
appreciate it greatly,

Holly C. Chase
Museum Coordinator
Chen Art Gallery
Sunrider International
1625 Abalone Ave.
Torrance, CA 90501
310-222-9219 ext 2219
Fax: 310-222-9075


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                  Conservation DistList Instance 21:7
                   Distributed: Monday, May 28, 2007
                        Message Id: cdl-21-7-025
                                  ***