The museum has found new ways to display familiar objects. Photo © Emily Sands

Sporting a country smock, Emily Sands went to the Museum of English Rural Life in Reading which opened to the public in July 2005 at a new site.

Most of us remember going on school outings to our rather dusty local rural life museum, but three years of redevelopment has meant that this new institution is light and airy with high tech video screens and exhibits that present farming history in a very relevant and almost artistic way.

Founded by the University of Reading, the museum is a gateway to the exploration of life and work in the countryside over the last 200 years and houses collections of national importance, including farming objects, photographs, film and books.

There is also a vast archive containing historic records, over one million photographs as well as a large reference library.

Photo © Emily Sands

The old site for the museum was built in the 1960s and was only ever meant to be temporary. Four decades on, the building was beginning to become dated and its small size meant some objects had to be kept out of sight. The new, much larger building means the entire collection can be on show.

The £10.89 million development has been supported by a £5.17 million grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund, and funding from the University of Reading along with other organisations.

Will Phillips from the Museum of English Rural Life, told 24 Hour Museum how some exhibitions are still in the process of installation and completion, giving visitors the chance to see a work in progress.

Photo © Emily Sands

He said, “Visitors might find it interesting to see how a museum looks when it is being developed, because it’s something they don’t normally get to experience.”

The new museum certainly helps visitors to see things differently, trying to find innovative ways to display objects.

On entrance, onlookers are presented with wagons raised high in the air, both saving space and providing a different view of a rural life museum staple.

“The under carriage of wagons are interesting in their own right,” said Will Phillips. “That’s where the strength and structure of the vehicle lies.”

Inventive use of space is a feature, and wooden farming equipment ranging from butter paddles to brooms, is attached to branch-like tubing which creates the feeling of a strange tree growing up over visitors’ heads.

The museum focuses on four materials as a basis for its exhibits: wood, metal, straw and leather. Will explained, “We’re a rural museum in an urban environment, so a lot of local visitors don’t know a huge amount about rural history and farming.

“That’s why we took the approach of centring displays around materials that everyone can relate to – physical objects made from local materials with regional designs and identities, rather than say, an exhibit on threshing that would require background knowledge”

Photo © Emily Sands

Also touched on, is the difference between these hardwearing materials and today’s more throwaway examples.

All the displays should be finished by the end of November, when there will be a formal opening with some very high profile guests.

Roy Brigden, keeper of the museum, said, “We are taking the opportunity to blow a few cobwebs off the way that rural material is presented to bring out the meaning and relevance that it can still have for people of today, whatever their age or background.”

The new museum’s collection is accessible and interesting, encouraging visitors to think in new ways. As a character in one of the films on show points out, “Folks lived like this, but their whole world was lost.”

Emily Sands is the 24 Hour Museum Renaissance Student Writer in the South Eastern region. Renaissance is the groundbreaking initiative to transform England's regional museums, led by MLA, the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council.