The Museum of London is halfway through a two-year process to remove 10,000 objects from display ahead of its relocation to a new site in Smithfield.
New behind-the-scenes footage shows the museum’s Pleasure Gardens display at its current home at London Wall being taken down and packed up by staff.
Staff at the museum started removing the 10,000 objects from view in January 2023 after the closure of the Museum of London’s Barbican home in December 2022.
As part of this process, the museum is barcoding, auditing, digitising and packing up each object individually. Items range from small artefacts to huge objects like the Selfridges lift.
The Museum of London, first opened at the Barbican in 1976, will debut at Smithfield Market as a world-class cultural destination in 2026. It will be renamed the London Museum.
“It is an extraordinary project,” Sharon Ament, director of the Museum of London, told blooloop in 2021.
“In creating the museum, we are working around three dimensions: time, people and place,” she added.
New museum to open at Smithfield in 2026
“Our museum is about London – London’s impact on the world and the world’s impact on London. We go back to when early humans started to inhabit the Thames Estuary, and we go right into the future. We are always about people.”
As above, the museum presents the story of London throughout history, from its first settlers to the people who live there today.
The Museum of London Docklands remains open as usual.
Images courtesy of the Museum of London
