Yup indeed. For some reason, too, the current trend is to replace like for like, eg: after the Windsor Casltle fire, brand new pale timbers, varnished and waxed up sit next to gnarly, blackened 400 year old ones, the idea being that the new ones 'should darken and patina over time'. Except that this isn't 1458 and there aren't clouds of nicotine/smoke, muck, animal fats spraying around any more, the place is a carefully controlled museum effectively. Those timbers will sit looking as out of place and odd-coloured in 500 years as they do now. It's bizarre.
Museum I was working at would stoically wipe over the old, dry, cracked leather (DYING for a feed of neatsfoot oil/leather cream etc) with a cloth and then sit there Brasso-ing up the brightwork of a 1912 Siddeley or whatever, each week, wearing off one micron of brass every single week. I inquired why not get it to shine, then laquer the brass, as opposed to wearing it away every time. 'That would not be original' was the reply.
People think museums are wonderful places, and they are, but there's a kind of hidden 'dark side' to them, of mad decisions which have sod all to do with looking after the exhibits.