Museum of London

The Museum of London is the place to go if you want to see and learn as much as you can about the history of London itself. It was established in the 1970s as a single entity, from collections contained in the Guildhall Museum, created in the 1820s, and the London Museum, a private collection housed in Kensington Palance starting in 1911. Our guide for the visit was Jon Cotton, the senior curator for prehistory.
Our visit centered around the prehistory -- or "London Before London" -- exhibit, which was reorganized about six years ago and includes the history of the London area before and up to the Roman invasion. One of the great challenges to the prehistory exhibit, Mr. Cotton said, is that when you say "prehistory", people think cavemen, dinosaurs, and The Flinstones. The challenge in creating and designing the exhibit was to help visitors overcome those preconceived ideas and realize that people who lived during the prehistory of London were just that -- people; sentient, inventive, adaptive survivalists. Mr. Cotton said in the exhibit they also wanted to convey the "power of place," the centrality of the Thames River and the interaction between the people and the surrounding
In creating the current version of the London Before London, Mr. Cotton said they worked closely with the designers to focus in on four messages they wanted visitors to take home with them: the people, the climate, the river, and the legacy. They focused on three design elements: the Landscape Wall, wooden plinthes, and the River Wall. The Landscape Wall attempts to give visitors an idea of how people interacted with the land around them over time. Interspersed along the wall are quotations and snatches of poetry. The wooden plinthes sit in the center of the room, and contain artifacts, objects and some short videos that tell the stories of the people and their settlements, technologies, and beliefs. The River Wall is a blue ribbon around the room that contains a multitude of objects that have been collected from the Thames River itself, illustrating how the river has always been a central element in the lives of those who make their homes around it. The items help illustrate in what ways these prehistoric peoples viewed the Thames.
Interestingly, Mr. Cotton told us that the designers used in creating this exhibit typically design retail and restaraunt spaces. Although this wasn't a deliberate choice, the result of that influence is a warm space that invites the visitor to stay a while and look around. In fact, Mr. Cotton said that the average time visitors spend in the London Before London exhibit has increased since the redesigned exhibit opened.
I really enjoyed the quotations and poetry along the Landscape Wall; it gives you more of a chance to make a personal connection with the people represented in the exhibit, and allows you to engage your imagination in the exhibit. I also loved how the exhibit was very multi-dimensional, using words, objects and video. There were also a few items that you could touch and feel, again making a connection. One of the most fascinating portions of the display was a prehistoric skeleton and accompanying video that demonstrated how they were able to take the reconstructed skull and make a clay model of the -- in this case a woman's -- face.
pictures were taken from www.museumoflondon.org.uk