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A Healthy Future for Thackray Medical Museum

Breaking News: It’s great to be able to share today that Thackray Medical Museum in Leeds has been awarded £1.5m from the Heritage Lottery Fund.

I became involved in this project earlier this year and for a short time worked with the team quite intensively to create an interpretation plan for the new galleries for the application. It was a joy to work with both the Thackray and Leach Studio teams to explore the collections and stories and learning programmes of the Thackray.

I am so pleased that HLF agree we have come up with an exciting and achievable plan for the presentation of these to a wider audience and representing a greater variety of voices. The content of this museum truly is relevant to everybody and I can’t wait to see the realisation of these plans.

Thackray have also secured £1m from Wellcome towards the £3.7m project to create new programmes, exhibitions and updated visitor facilities, including a mock operating theatre, as well as essential repairs to the Grade II listed building.

ITV News Story

Thackray Medical Museum new op theatre

Thackray Medical Museum Concept Design by Leach Studio

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Science and Technology Interactives at National Museum of Scotland

Today is the public opening of the new galleries at the National Museum of Scotland: Six new Science and Technology galleries and four from the department of Art and Design.

This is the most recent phase of the Masterplan for the Victorian building on the Chambers Street site which began with the Connect gallery in 2005 and included the ‘Royal Museum Project‘ galleries which opened in 2011.

Together with two colleagues, I have been managing the interactive displays for these galleries for nearly three years. While my colleagues managed the software and film contractors, I mainly concentrated on the mechanical interactive exhibits in the Science and Technology galleries. Here are a few pics of some of the star hands-on items, gallery by gallery:

National Museum of Scotland, science and technology interactives

Energy Wheel

Explore

  • National Museum of Scotland, science and technology interactives balloons

    Hot Air Balloons

  • National Museum of Scotland, science and technology interactives lift yourself

    Lift Yourself

Making it

  • National Museum of Scotland, science and technology interactives qcfar

    Quality Control

  • National Museum of Scotland, science and technology interactives assemblyline

    Assembly Line

  • National Museum of Scotland, science and technology interactives cogs gears

    Cogs and Gears

  • National Museum of Scotland, science and technology interactives cogs gears

    Cogs and Gears

Energise

  • National Museum of Scotland, science and technology interactives energy wheel

    Energy Wheel, Energise, National Museum of Scotland

  • National Museum of Scotland, science and technology interactives wave tank

    Wave tank

  • National Museum of Scotland, science and technology interactives waterturbine

    Water Turbine, Energise, National Museum of Scotland

Enquire

  • National Museum of Scotland, science and technology interactives wimshurst

    Wimshurst Machine, Enquire, National Museum of Scotland

  • National Museum of Scotland, science and technology interactives zoetrope

    Zoetrope

  • National Museum of Scotland, science and technology interactives inside explorer

    Medical Imaging

  • National Museum of Scotland, science and technology interactives cloudchamber

    Cloud Chamber

  • National Museum of Scotland, science and technology interactives plasmaball

    Plasma Ball, Enquire, National Museum of Scotland

  • National Museum of Scotland, science and technology interactives maxwells

    Maxwell’s Wheels

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Exciting Funding News at Kew Gardens

I am very pleased to share the news that the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) have awarded £14.7million for the restoration of the historic Temperate House at Kew Gardens.

This is particularly exciting news for me as I spent most of last year from early Summer into the Autumn working for Kew on this funding application. In May 2012 I responded to an invitation to tender for the interpretation content research which led to a much larger involvement than expected right through to October 2012.

On appointment I visited the gardens a number of times, speaking to the Community Engagement, Learning, Horticulture, Ethnobotany, Marketing and Digital Media teams. What I discovered at the existing Temperate House was a place and collection with an incredibly exciting potential. It is the largest surviving Victorian glasshouse in the world, covering 4,880 square meters and up to 19 metres high. Some investigation revealed that the plants shown there display the richness of the plant kingdom across all the inhabited continents of the world and could be used to tell stories about Kew’s role in global plant conservation, sustainable development and maintaining biodiversity.

The CEVIC (Community Education and Visitor Interpretation Centre)

Temperate House (from Treetop walkway)

Kew Gardens chilli interp

Chilli interpretation panel

In August, based on the success of the content research contract, my role was extended to include delivery of an Interpretation Strategy including visual representations of the potential interpretation.

The main challenge for the Interpretation was the vast range of plants and the fact they come from such different parts of the world. Also the word ‘temperate’ does not really excite most visitors. Confusingly, it has slightly differing definitions in horticulture and world geography and is more often a zone defined by what it is not (polar or tropical) than what it is.

Although individual plant stories were already well told in the glasshouse, the key themes behind the selection and display of the plants and the organisation of their layout was not clear to visitors. In addition, Kew has ambitions through this project to really push forward their interpretation and community engagement and broaden their existing audience.

Plants in the Temperate House illustrate well the important role that plants play in people’s lives all over the world and stories of exploration and travel from the earliest plant hunters to modern-day field-work and conservation projects. Working with the community engagement staff, we analysed the current Kew audience and target under-represented audiences to see how the information we have about those groups might help us structure the Temperate House to enable engagement with a broad cross-section of visitors and future visitors.

This work, along with the Kew brand guidelines and working with the newly identified plant stories enabled us to identify three key themes for the plant stories as well as a layout which complemented the horticultural needs of the displays and an aesthetic with broad appeal.

Kew Gardens tea kidspanel

Tea interpretation panel for children

Design team Bright3d successfully pitched to create the visuals for this aesthetic and interpretation plan. They refined our ideas and visualised them in some fantastic sketches that show the potential visitor experience and how the interpretation could work sympathetically with both the plant collection and the historic building.

As acknowledged by HLF the project:

“…will not only enable vital conservation of the Grade I listed heritage building, the largest Victorian glasshouse in the world, but will result in a more inspiring public display for visitors and help broaden awareness of the importance of plants through learning and engagement programmes with community groups”.

I am very pleased that the HLF have recognised the huge potential of the Temperate House project, and I’d like to take this opportunity to congratulate the Kew team on their hard work and wish them all the best for the next phase of fundraising and delivery, and thank Bright3d for their work with us.

Richard Deverell, Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, says:

“This project represents a real step change in the way in which Kew will communicate and bring to life why plants matter, why saving them matters and ultimately why Kew’s science and horticultural expertise matters.”

“We want to use the Temperate House to open up visitors’ minds and imaginations to look at plants and Kew in a new light.”

More info:
http://www.hlf.org.uk/news/Pages/KewTemperateHouse.aspx
http://www.kew.org/support-kew/donate-now/temperate-house-appeal/

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Energy Lab

I am very excited to announce that the Energy Lab at the National Mining Museum Scotland is almost ready to launch!

You can read about the origins of the project in this blog post. Since I wrote that in May, we have been very busy working with our designers and fabricators; Leach Colour to create the exhibits for the space.

Roger Meachem of Yet Science CIC has worked hard with the museum staff on a supporting teachers’ resource full of pre- and post-visit activities about energy and engineering challenges. And Ryan Sturrock of Walk the Line Productions has filmed presenter Emily Carr demonstrating some of these activities for the supporting dvd and YouTube clips.

National Mining Museum, Scotland Energy lab exterior

The Energy Lab

National Mining Museum, Scotland Energy lab

Introduction

We have collected objects, photographs and film footage donated kindly by Professor Stephen Salter, the University of Edinburgh, Jamie Taylor, Artemis Intelligent Power and Pelamis Wave Power.

And we have welcomed teachers and p6/7 pupils from three local schools to try out the activities, interactives and teachers’ pack.

National Mining Museum, Scotland

Generating Electricity and Energy Changes exhibits

National Mining Museum, Scotland wave energy

Wave Energy interactive

National Mining Museum, Scotland the duck

Salter’s Duck display

All that’s left to do is a little bit of final snagging before we welcome Fiona Hyslop, Scottish Government Minister for Culture and External Affairs to open the space formally on 1st October. Then we’ll get our teachers’ pack and film clips live on the museum website and compile our post-project evaluation report for our funders, the Royal Academy of Engineering.

Let’s hope that the Energy Lab can help inspire some of the children of the coal-mining areas of Midlothian to turn their creative problem-solving energy towards engineering a sustainable energy future for us all!

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InMotion : Edinburgh Science Festival 2012

One of my very first jobs as a freelancer was project managing the temporary exhibition InMotion for the Edinburgh Science Festival. 

I worked with the Festival staff from December 2011 to help them turn their creative ideas into real physical exhibits. I brought suitable designers on-board (Stuart Kerr and Chris Peters), and the exhibit build company (FifeX). I worked with all the exhibition partners, keeping to a challenging budget, and getting all the elements into position for the big day. It was a challenging but really fun project.

Finally, after a lot of hard work from everybody, the exhibition ‘boxes’ were delivered to the Museum after closing on Wednesday night, set up and then wrapped up in big ribbons and bows until the opening party on Thursday night.

Everyday from 30 March until the 15 April, InMotion took pride of place in the Grand Gallery at the National Museum of Scotland, allowing visitors to discover the science of human movement through a series of workshops, performances and interactive exhibits.

  • InMotion : Edinburgh International Science Festival 2012

  • InMotion : Edinburgh International Science Festival 2012

  • InMotion : Edinburgh International Science Festival 2012

InMotion was quite unique in that it was part festival, part exhibition, part workshop and part performance space. An exhibition run by a science festival is quite different to any other exhibition; the exhibits were designed not only to be highly interactive but also to have quite a high level of facilitation from the science festival’s fantastic team of ‘science communicators’.

You can see the communicators in blue t-shirts in many of these photos, but what you can’t see in a photo is the sheer energy and enthusiasm they brought to the activities. All day every day the team engaged with visitors who flocked to the museum during a rainy Easter break in numbers that rivaled those seen in the first month after the re-opening.

The team tirelessly engaged, enthused, explained, encouraged and inspired and their contribution to the successful visitor experience should not be underestimated.

Copyright: Robyn Braham / Edinburgh Science Festival

Copyright: Robyn Braham / Edinburgh Science Festival
  • Copyright: Isabel Buenz / Edinburgh Science Festival

    Copyright: Isabel Buenz / Edinburgh Science Festival

  • Copyright: Isabel Buenz / Edinburgh Science Festival

    Copyright: Isabel Buenz / Edinburgh Science Festival

  • Copyright: Isabel Buenz / Edinburgh Science Festival

    Copyright: Isabel Buenz / Edinburgh Science Festival

  • Copyright: Robyn Braham / Edinburgh Science Festival

    Copyright: Robyn Braham / Edinburgh Science Festival

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