Collection care and access 

Te Papa is committed to lending its collection items to non-profit organisations for public exhibition or to approved institutions for research purposes.

Find out how the conservation team cares for the many collections and thousands of treasures held at Te Papa.

Te Papa has a Collection Development Policy, which provides the overarching policy and guiding principles for collection development.

Explore here some of the history behind Te Papa’s Māori, Pacific, Art and Visual Culture, History, and Natural History Collections.

Te Papa's responsibilities for the management of the national collections are set out in the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa Act 1992. 

Find out about the various ways that members of the public can access Te Papa’s collections and archives.

Every year staff at Te Papa field thousands of questions on everything from art to zoology and are asked to identify a bewildering array of objects and natural history specimens. This page tells you how to get the answers you need.