The Innu Nation is celebrating the discovery of a historically significant artifact that was recently uncovered in storage in North West River, Labrador.

A caribou skin coat, believed to date back to the early 1910s, was identified this week in a freezer at the Labrador Heritage Society.

The Innu Nation says surviving examples of such coats are very rare. Some currently exist in the collections of the Royal Ontario Museum, the Museum of History, and The Rooms.

Made of carefully sewn and painted caribou skins, the coats were typically worn by Innu hunters and shamans.

The Innu Nation is working with the provincial museum and Labrador Heritage Society to ensure the coat is preserved and transported to The Rooms.

They are also working to establish a Labrador Innu Cultural Facility to maintain their cultural and historic collections, and repatriate artifacts from the collections of other institutions.