Comprising approximately 508,000 artifact fragments, Australia's Commonwealth Block Assemblage is the largest nineteenth century urban assemblage in the world. Internationally recognised as a significant resource for the study of the modern city, nationally and trans-nation-ally, the full potential of the Commonwealth Block assemblage has not been fully realised, in part due to 20 years of inadequate collection management. A reinterpretation of material from the assemblage for display at Melbourne Museum in 2008 brought to light some of the collection management problems, and it was realised that drastic intervention into the way the assemblage was managed was needed: to ensure ongoing research and interpretive use, to provide physical and intellectual access, and to reflect contemporary demands for sustainable management of cultural resources. This paper provides an account of the rehabilitation project instigated by Museum Victoria in collaboration with La Trobe University to rectify the identified collection management problems.
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