I am reminded, this week, of this sign at end of the visitor experience in the museum/visitor experience in the EU Parliament building. Farewell, faithful friend. This new world might be strange, but we won’t be strangers …
While the museum is closed, visitors to the museum’s website can rummage around in this 360° version of a magistrates courtroom online. It’s a clever way of encouraging people to step into a historic space when we still can’t go to museums …
Before the current global pandemic, vaccines were estimated to save between 2 and 3 million lives a year. And they’re set to touch all of our lives, soon. The story of vaccination doesn’t start in a modern lab, but in this hut …
Museums and heritage sites like to offer their audio guide in plenty in languages, enabling as many people as possible to have a chance of listening to the interpretation. How many is your site’s audio tour available in? …
I took this picture for use in my new book Interpreting Heritage: A Guide to Planning and Practice to illustrate the range of printed leaflets heritage sites hand out. I can’t be the only person who hoards these …
The label for this little car left me smiling: “The examiner shows you the brakes, give you a half-hour drive-about and that’s it. Your driving test – if you can call it that – is over. Lessons? What lessons? …
Striking royal blue brocade and bright gold thread. Bright as day and over 90 years old. Whatever kind of event ‘Bolton Civic Week’ was, it was worthy of creating something as beautiful as this …
When I came across these two faces online, I wondered if they’re called ‘grotesque’ because they’ve got menacing faces. Or perhaps if it’s reference to the architectural term ‘grotesque’ for a mythical or fantastical …
Those seeking to engage the youth vote in American elections don’t just need to encourage people to think about politics – they need to remove every excuse for not going to the polling station, including the rain …
Charles Darwin (1809 –82) was an enthusiastic beetle collector and, with his friend and cousin William Darwin Fox, rarely attended lectures at Cambridge, preferring to go ‘beetling’ instead …
You might remember the scene in Derry Girls where students are asked to write things that protestants and catholics have in common, and also their differences. The resulting satire of sectarianism …
Despite being 1600 years old, this seven-metre high pillar has never rusted. It was made during the reign of Chandragupta II (reigned about 375–415) – we know this because the lack of rusting has resulted in the inscription remaining clear and readable …
This map of Sir William Hustler’s estates, painted on a huge sheet of sailcloth, is a piece of dynastic propaganda. At 13 feet square, it’s far too big to have been used as a tool for land management. This is for show …
Battle of Waterloo, 1815
Marquess of Anglesey: "By God, sir, I've lost my leg!"
Duke of Wellington: "By God, sir, so you have!"
This porcelain bowl was found among the ruins of the city after the atomic bomb explosion on 6 August 1945. As a result of the heat of the explosion, the glaze melted and sand and stones became embedded in it. The bomb killed …
Although the house is named after its rare Jacobean cage-newel staircase (there are only three surviving in the country), there is so much more to a visit here than just some stairs. In fact, there’s almost everything you’d want from a historic house visit …
When was the last time you saw a replica of a museum object being paraded through the streets to the sound of cheering crowds? The boat, used by the Castro brothers and their small revolutionary force to land on Cuba in 1956 …
This bust of the legendary drag queen, Divine, was created by a friend, the delightfully eccentric artist, Andrew Logan. It’s made in Logan’s trademark mosaic style – the hair glistening like …
A secret carving, left for us by a dead man. Before the network of tunnels running under the streets of Paris was a catacomb – currently home to thousands of bodies – it was a mine for the stone …
Written interpretation doesn’t always need to be upright. Here’s a charming example of a quotation from Charlotte Brontë, set in a stone in the garden at Plymouth Grove, home of fellow author Mrs Gaskell …
The only dog ever enlisted in the Royal Navy was Just Nuisance, a Great Dane that served in HMS Afrikander, a shore establishment in Simon’s Town (South Africa) between 1939 and 1944. His escapades and heroics …
Museum collections often feature what have become known as ‘curios’ – peculiar little things that are one of a kind and often come with intriguing, dare I say tall, stories. And this is a fine example of one such incongruous item …
An enterprising Dutch sea captain took a young Indian rhinoceros to the Netherlands in 1741 and then toured her extensively across Europe. ‘Miss Clara’, as she was known, was the first example to have been seen …
A rhomboid of pink light, projected into the corner of a room, gives the impression of a 3-D pyramid, glowing and hovering in the darkness. James Turrell is known for encouraging us to look and look again …
What do you see when you look at this statue? Personally, I don’t see a flattering image of the queen. Instead, I’m more inclined to agree with Mark E Smith. In The Fall song City Hobgoblins he says: “So Queen Victoria is a large black slug in Piccadilly, Manchester.”
This is a map of movement –a cartographic history of the migration of the Aztec from Aztlán to Tenochtitlan. It’s the only map of its kind thought to exist. The footprints on the map tell …
