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Case studies
Celebrating my family collection
As part of Lincolnshire Heritage Services programme of celebrating collections each County Council run museum took a different approach to the theme. The Museum of Lincolnshire Life worked with the Stamp End Tenants and Residents Association to put on an exhibition about family life at the museum.
Using oral histories from the community group coupled with artefacts from the museum's collection and loaned items, the exhibition provided a slice of local life through the 20th century for visitors.
For more information about the challenges faced in putting the exhibition together, include the impact of a member of staff getting a new job, read the full case study below.
A Derby shop through the centuries
Derby Museum and Art Gallery was donated the conte
nts of a local chemist’s shop, Cope and Taylor’s, that closed in 1972. It might not sound the kind of thing that is given to a museum; however the shop was the oldest pharmacy business in Derby and dated back to 1675.
The donation included all the fixtures and fittings as well as the potions and pills, many elements dating back to the 19th century. This new addition was boxed and had sat on shelves in storage at the museum since its acquisition, until Anja Rohde and Jan Gough came to document the collection.
Find out more about Anja and Jan's work to document the collection and find out what happened to the items by downloading the case study below.
A shop through the centuries (25 kb) ![[doc]](http://emmlac-live.torchboxapps.com/display_images/document_icons/doc.gif){kind=icon}
Going Japanese in Derby
Anja Rohde had been involved in the documentation of Derby Museums and Art Gallery’s ethnographic collection, including a particular star exhibit – a suit of Samurai armour. During discussions of possible future exhibitions, this item inspired a suggestion of something linked to Japan, a connection that went beyond the museum with Toyota, a Japanese owned car manufacturer, based locally. 
Anja had an interest in things Japanese and she worked with the museum and art gallery's exhibitions officer, Andrea Hadley Johnson, to develop the exhibition.
The result was a cross discipline exhibition of existing items at the Museum and Art Gallery: the Crown Derby porcelain, the suit of armour and a range of Japanese prints and new installations.
Find out more about how the Japan exhibition happened by downloading the full case study below.
Two days in the week of ...
As part of Louisa Selby’s role as one of Nottingham’s collections access assistants she works one day a week with a range of curators at Nottingham City Museums and Galleries including Nottingham Castle’s keeper of fine art, th
e keeper of community history at Brewhouse Yard and the museums services keeper of costume and textiles.
Working with different staff members, Louise has a varied role from sorting through the thousands of items in the fine art collection to developing displays and exhibitions for Brewhouse Yard.
For more information about what Louisa has been doing, download the full case study below.
Two days in the week of the Nottinghamshire collections access assistant (28 kb)
Street Life
Northampton Museum and Art Gallery’s collections access assistant, Lee Hutchinson, has introduced young people, most of whom are excluded from mainstream schooling and live in one of the most deprived areas of Northampton, to their area’s history and the wealth of inspiration and interest in the town’s museums.
‘Street Life’ is a wide ranging programme to engage young people with their past and the town’s future through a range of activities, including film making, curating and even a music competition. The aim of the project is to increase participation in heritage and broaden the range of visitors to the Museum and Art Gallery.
Download a copy of the full case study and the project interim report below
Benchmarks in Collections Care
Renaissance East Midlands funded a two year programme to support twenty museums to go through the Benchmarks in Collections Care process. The aim was to support the smaller and independent museums, particularly those that were aiming for Accreditation, and take them through the Benchmarking process, to define their position in relation to professional standards of care and to develop suggested actions to help inform the development of an improvement plan for their sites. The information was also used by Renaissance East Midlands to identify region wide trends in provision of care for collections.
Find out more about how the support helped museums and how the process worked in the case study below.
Northampton museums reminiscence sessions
Part of the role of the collections access assistant, Lee Hutchinson, at Northampton Museum and Art Gallery has been to increase access for older people to the collections at the museum. This has proved a challenge for older people with limited mobility or lacking the resources or facilities to go to the museum in the town centre.
So, instead of getting older people to the museum, working with Age Concern, other Northampton charities and his colleagues, Lee took the museum to them.
Find out more about Northampton Museum and Art Gallery's work with older people by downloading the full case study below.
Native Americans in Derby
Derby Museum and Art Gallery had loaned Benjamin West’s painting ‘General Johnson saving a wounded French officer from the tomahawk of a North American Indian’ to museums in Canada and the United States of America as part of a touring exhibition on the French and Indian War. The work appeared on the front of the exhibition catalogue and finished the tour hanging in Washington’s Smithsonian Institute.
The profile of this painting linked to some of Spencer Bailey’s documentation work, finding artefacts linked to Native Americans in Derby Museum and Art Gallery’s stores and prompted an idea for an exhibition on Native Americans in the museum bringing together art and artefacts.
Find out more about the project and Spencer's dash to Washington to get the painting back in time for the Derby exhibition opening by downloading the full case study below.
The Beautiful Game
During the 2006 World Cup, Leicestershire collections access assistants Alex Davy and Caroline Lockwood helped to develop an exhibition for Snibston Discovery Park’s fashion gallery based on football associated clothing: ‘The Beautiful Game: Football and Fashion’.
The exhibition included football kits from across the ages including Leicester City player, Richard Stearman's, strip and Sir Stanley Matthews’ England cap from the 1950 World Cup. Other highlights included a 2002 England World Cup squad Burton's suit, a vast display of football boots, a Y-3 designer football and a commemorative head scarf given to players’ wives at the 1966 World Cup.
The museum objects were complemented with giant images, including footballers past and present and crowds of supporters at football matches. These images helped to demonstrate the development of the football kit and the clothing worn by fans. The exhibition really captured the imagination of many of the school groups visiting the gallery.
The local media loved the exhibition and BBC Radio Leicester still features a photo-gallery on the BBC website.
‘The Beautiful Game’ will also become one of Leicestershire Heritage Services’ first online exhibitions, capturing the exhibition permanently and giving many more people the chance to relive past football memories.
What's For Dinner?
Caroline Lockwood and Alex Davy, Leicestershire’s collections access assistants have been working with a range of Leicestershire County Council museum sites to help both document objects, but also to develop engaging displays and exhibitions based on some of the gems found in museum stores.
At Charnwood Museum in Loughborough Caroline and Alex were given the opportunity to develop a small exhibition from start to finish. The idea behind the exhibition was to explore contemporary collecting, involving local people and organisations outside the museum, alongside items from the stores.
With a limited amount of time to develop, design and put on the exhibition, they had to be creative, especially in thinking of ways to get others outside the museum involved. Caroline and Alex opted for a theme that everyone could relate to – food, with an exhibition called ‘What’s for Dinner?’
There was not time to engage with local community groups to develop projects as part of the exhibition, but the universality of the topic meant that requests for food packaging and culinary anecdotes resulted in a number of new exhibits and new acquisitions for the museum. The display showed all the different foods that are available to eat in Loughborough, including a wide range of International food and local produce from establishments such as the Wicked Hathern Brewery and Stonehurst Family Farm.
A children’s drawing competition was held during the 2007 Easter Holiday to support the display. Children were asked to look at the display and draw their favourite meal on a paper plate.
