Delivering state of the art heritage digitisation services worldwide

Delivering state of the art heritage digitisation services worldwide

Delivering state of the art heritage digitisation services worldwide

A MEMORIST company, Arkhênum has been providing digitisation and sharing services for heritage and industrial collections for over 25 years. Our services are carried out either in our own workshops or directly on site, wherever our clients may be. Watch our video to see the heritage collections we have helped safeguard in 2025…

Cutting-edge digitisation projects

Over the past 25 years, Arkhênum has continuously expanded its range of scanners to digitise all types of collections: 2D scanning, packshot format digitisation, 360° object scanning, microfilms and more.

Among our latest innovations is the ability to digitise documents that cannot be fully opened, thanks to our 45° scanning service. A suite of combined 180°/120° scanners combined with the 45° option, can be organized for our client’s projects.

We have also made significant strides in metadata enrichment through the use of artificial intelligence, particularly in handwriting recognition and image analysis. As a result, you can benefit from more accurate indexing of your documents and considerable time savings.

Using 2D scanning services to digitise documents that can't be fully opened

Support from collection preparation through to dissemination

Expert tips on how to clean heritage collections preventing any further damage over time
With more and more clients turning to us for support both before and after digitisation, Arkhênum has developed a range of services including audits, inventory reconciliation and even preventive conservation of collections. We can support your teams on a specific project or during a defined period, helping you launch the digitisation of your archives under optimal conditions.

Ensuring the physical and digital preservation of the collections in your care is your primary responsibility. But the other side of your mission—making them accessible and promoting their value—often requires specific expertise that may not be available in-house. Arkhênum can support you across a range of communication channels, from setting up digital libraries to producing editorial content, heritage films, commemorative books and even exhibition spaces. For each of your projects, we draw on our team of 100 experts to select the profiles best suited to your needs. This team includes archivists, historians, digitisation specialists, digital library managers and more.

Explore our successful heritage projects

Curious to learn more about our work? Discover the projects we have delivered for organisations like yours. You can browse by area of expertise (digitisation audits, preventive heritage conservation, on-site scanning and more) and find the project(s) that speak directly to your needs and challenges.

Ready to digitise your heritage collections? Contact our experts for a free consultation and ensure your documents are preserved for future generations.

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Every page turned is an archived story

Hand over the money!

Hand over the money!

Founded in 864 by Charles II, the Monnaie de Paris – France’s official mint – is the nation’s oldest institution and one of the world’s longest-standing companies. The mint was Paris’s first factory and remains one of the few still in operation today. The Monnaie de...

Delivering state of the art heritage digitisation services worldwide

Delivering state of the art heritage digitisation services worldwide

A MEMORIST company, Arkhênum has been providing digitisation and sharing services for heritage and industrial collections for over 25 years. Our services are carried out either in our own workshops or directly on site, wherever our clients may be. Watch our video to...

Maison d’Érasme shines a light on its censored texts

Maison d’Érasme shines a light on its censored texts

Arkhênum has just started a new project in Belgium at the Maison d'Érasme museum in Anderlecht. This commission is unique in a number of ways: First, due to the specialised processing of the collections (object-mode digitisation followed by page-by-page digitisation...

Bon Marché Rive Gauche: safeguarding the oral memory of the Parisian department store

Bon Marché Rive Gauche: safeguarding the oral memory of the Parisian department store

09 April 2025

Bon Marché Rive Gauche: safeguarding the oral memory of the Parisian department store

An artist’s rendition of the Le Bon Marché Rive Gauche, the first department store in the world when it opened its doors in 1852. The image has been provided by the Bibliothèque Nationale de France.
© Bibliothèque Nationale de France

Client

Bon Marché Rive Gauche

Expertise implemented
(Re)constitution of collections

BACKGROUND

Aristide and Marguerite Boucicaut founded Paris’s first department store in 1852. As the Boucicauts transformed an existing novelty shop into a model of commercial innovation, Le Bon Marché revolutionised the high street. The original building grew to become the epitome of modern retail, offering customers fixed prices, home delivery, sales, and even mail-order shopping. Aristide and Marguerite were also dedicated philanthropists who prioritised the well-being of their employees: the couple created a provident fund and provided free medical care. Today, Le Bon Marché Rive Gauche is celebrating over 170 years of history.

Challenges

As a specialist in the collection and promotion of oral history, Arkhênum was commissioned by Le Bon Marché Rive Gauche to collect oral testimonies. The project’s aim was to set up and organise Le Bon Marché’s archive collection and document the creation of its artistic direction. This work resulted in two video interviews, one with Frédéric Bodenes, Artistic and Image Director of Le Bon Marché Rive Gauche and La Grande Épicerie de Paris, and the other with Monica Burckhardt, Curator of the Toys Department of the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, who was behind the initial work on the department store’s heritage collections.

Preserving the collective memory of an iconic institution

Le Bon Marché Rive Gauche sought to preserve these two oral testimonies which document an important chapter in its history. With filming complete, Arkhênum produced chronological, thematic and analytical indexes that allow users to search the videos, either by keywords or time segments. The archived voices of the two employees can also be used in the department store’s future heritage promotion projects. These recordings supplement the company’s heritage archive collection.

A behind-the-scenes look at the in-situ filming of oral testimonies at Bon Marché, capturing living memories for archival preservation.

In situ filming

The Arkhênum team filmed the interviews on site at Le

Bon Marché Rive Gauche. An oral-archives specialist

led the interviews using questionnaires tailored to each participant.

SHARE THIS ARTICLE

Every page turned is an archived story

Hand over the money!

Hand over the money!

Founded in 864 by Charles II, the Monnaie de Paris – France’s official mint – is the nation’s oldest institution and one of the world’s longest-standing companies. The mint was Paris’s first factory and remains one of the few still in operation today. The Monnaie de...

Delivering state of the art heritage digitisation services worldwide

Delivering state of the art heritage digitisation services worldwide

A MEMORIST company, Arkhênum has been providing digitisation and sharing services for heritage and industrial collections for over 25 years. Our services are carried out either in our own workshops or directly on site, wherever our clients may be. Watch our video to...

Maison d’Érasme shines a light on its censored texts

Maison d’Érasme shines a light on its censored texts

Arkhênum has just started a new project in Belgium at the Maison d'Érasme museum in Anderlecht. This commission is unique in a number of ways: First, due to the specialised processing of the collections (object-mode digitisation followed by page-by-page digitisation...

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