Creating a Better Museum

An article about Wakefield Museum was published by Museums and Heritage Advisor:

CREATING A BETTER MUSEUM IN FINANCIALLY CHALLENGING TIMES

Ensuring that our museums continue to prosper in these difficult economic times is the major challenge facing the museum sector. One possible way forward for protecting museum’s in the future is through co-location and integration with other services to reduce overall operating costs and improved efficiencies whilst benefiting from new and exciting synergies that can lead to improved customer experience.

As a consequence of the Government’s Comprehensive Spending Review in October 2010, Wakefield Council had to look closely at all its services to address a significant budgetary deficit and the Museum Service was no exception and it had to find a way to reduced its overall running costs whilst ensuring that core services continued to be delivered to the public remain.    

To meet this challenge the Museum Service  had to do something radical and to face up to a major operation issue – the future of Wakefield Museum.

To read the full article - click here. 

Artists in the Atrium

Wakefield One Atrium Case Commission

We have recently been successful in securing funding from Arts Council England for a project to commission an artist or cultural organisation to create an installation using Wakefield Council’s museum objects in an innovative and exciting way - a special showcase in the Lower Atrium of Wakefield One. 

We are looking for an artist to use our collections as inspiration to create a beautifully engaging display. Combining artistic practice, be it sculpture, multimedia or painting, with museum objects to wow, thrill and surprise our visitors. Take this opportunity to amaze us with ideas that allow people to engage with museum collections in a different way. As long as the objects are safeguarded we will consider anything…

The prominent atrium case (currently contains a printing press)

We have pre-selected two areas of our collections to choose from to act as the centre point and inspiration for the installation. They are either:

·         Architectural stonework - The museum collections include numerous examples of feature stonework from now demolished buildings across the district.

·         Painted bath - A late Victorian painted and stencilled metal bath

Project budget: up to £4000

An example of the architectural stonework available

Painted bath - the inside is painted to look like marble!

Project timetable:  Closing date for proposals 1 July 2013. Display to open in October 2013.

For full details of the commission and how to apply please e-mail 

All in a flap!

Vote for your favourite 1920s dress

The 1920s are coming to Wakefield Museum but we are all in a flap!

Historic costume enthusiast Nicola Townend has been back with us to start preparing a 1920s display in our Dress to Impress case. Beaded flapper dresses are the order of the day, but Nicola can’t decide which one to use.

We have a short-list of three dresses, all from the 1920s, when jazz and the Charleston came to Wakefield.

Our current Dress to Impress display explores a night out in Wakefield in the 1820s

Nicola examines one of the dresses - we are spoilt for choice!

Pick your favourite by ticking the 'funny', 'interesting' or 'cool' reaction boxes under the dress picture you like the best. The dress with the most reactions by  Sunday 30 June will go on display at the end of July.

All in a flap - Dress 1

Vote on your favourite 1920s dress by clicking on any of the cool / interesting / funny buttons below!

Dress option 1

A plain black dress decorated with bead patterns and fabric strips, 1920s

All in a flap - Dress 2

Vote on your favourite 1920s dress by clicking on any of the cool / interesting / funny buttons below!

Dress option 2

Black dress with underskirts decorated with explosions of white beads

All in a flap - Dress 3

Vote on your favourite 1920s dress by clicking on any of the cool / interesting / funny buttons below!

Dress option 3

 

A pink dress decorated with glass beads and sequins, forming stylised flower  patterns,  1924-1927

Fun for 2-5 year olds!

Yesterday was full of fun out of the sun for the Crafty Crocs at Wakefield Museum.  Our theme this month was shapes.  We looked in the museum for squares, rectangles, circles and triangles using squishy shapes as our guide.

Back in the learning zone our crafty crocs designed some shape monsters and created a collage of shapes on to a picture of a Cayman.

The best fun was had when we experimented with sticking foam shapes to a window with water – here are some of the pictures we created using our foam shapes.

The next Crafty Crocs sessions are on Tuesday 2 July 10 – 11am and 1:15 – 2:15pm booking on essential as places are limited.  Call 01924 302700 or e-mail