MID birthday celebrations
1 June 2004
Museum in Docklands celebrates its first birthday on 5 June 2004.
“The River Thames is Liquid History.” John Burns, 1929
Without the Thames, London would not have existed. The river has made London the great international city that it is today. For two thousand years, the river has been a two-way route for people, trade and ideas. The history of the river, its port and people are all explored at the Museum in Docklands.
With 110,00 sq. feet of gallery space displaying just under 3000 objects, the Museum in Docklands is the largest Museum to open in London for over 20 years. Many of these objects have never been publicly displayed before and are now housed in one of Britain’s oldest surviving warehouses. Originally built to store and handle coffee, rum, molasses and sugar, No.1 Warehouse, West India Quay, today houses over 2,000 years of London’s history.
Complementing the displays in the galleries is a continual diary of lectures, special events, educational activities and film screenings.
Charting an unexplored area of London’s history, the Museum in Docklands tells the story of the river, port and its people, from the arrival of the Romans to the rise of Canary Wharf. Housed in one of the first warehouses of the enclosed docks, the Museum stands on the edge of West India Quay in the heart of the Docklands. The quayside, nicknamed Blood Alley after the damaged hands, necks and backs of dockers who once heaved sacks of raw sugar from nearby sailing ships, is today overlooked by the skyscrapers of Canary Wharf.
The Museum’s thousands of objects and pictures capture the people and places behind the area’s dramatic transformation. Many are unique, having been rescued during the 1970s and 80s after containerisation and competition forced London’s port to move downstream. Interactives, videos, models and recreations explore the lives of those who built and shaped the port’s long riverfront, from yesterday’s gentleman pirates to today’s city workers.
Led by Time Team’s Tony Robinson, visitors can explore the early ports of London, from the Saxon settlement in Covent Garden to the medieval port at Billingsgate. Enormous whale-bones mark one of the uses of the early wet docks at Rotherhithe in the 18th century, when London was at the centre of the world whaling trade, while a gibbet cage set at the end of a recreation of a Legal Quay reveals the fate of those engaged in organised crime.
In Sailortown, visitors can wander through a series of mid-19th century alleyways, when ships jostled to unload their wares, the air was suffused with the smells of exotic goods, and the sound of a dozen different languages echoed along the wharves. Throughout the Museum are the stories of people from every corner of the globe, from the Lascars of India, to the Irish, Scandinavians and Chinese, all of who came to settle on the Thames waterside.
Historic photographs and printed materials from the Port of London Authority Archive show the vast scale of the docks at the turn of the 20th century, providing tantalising glimpses into a time when everything, from snake skins to cinnamon, cars to live elephants, were brought into the Warehouse of the World. Original plans, pamphlets and engineering drawings uncover the debate surrounding the founding of the new docks from 1802. Workshop reconstructions stand as testimony to the many traditional port trades now mostly lost.
Rarely seen film from the Metropolitan Fire Brigade and captured Nazi footage in Docklands at War documents the impact of the Blitz on the area during 1940. For the first time, oral testimonies are combined with footage from the Imperial War Museum to explore the port’s role in secret projects such as the Pipe Line Under the Ocean. A series of original canvases by official war artist William Ware dramatically capture the full extent of the destruction.
A series of proposed plans show what could have happened to the area before the London Docklands Development Corporation began their controversial regeneration of the docks in the 1980s. The transformation from wasteland to new city is seen through the eyes of both communities and developers, as gentrified warehouses and soaring offices attract more and more people to Docklands each year.
The transformation of the warehouse during the 1990s into the Museum was closely co-ordinated with English Heritage, and an £8.5 million shell and core conversion, carried out in sympathy with the original structure, has retained many of the building’s distinctive features. The result is a contemporary museum that highlights No. 1 Warehouse as one of the greatest objects in its collection, allowing the building itself to form an integral part of the overall visitor experience.
Editor’s notes:
Visit the Museum in Docklands’ website: www.museumoflondon.org.uk
The Museum in Docklands is part of the Museum of London Group. For information on other venues in the Museum of London group visit: www.museumoflondon.org.uk
The Museum of London Picture Library holds over 35,000 images, illustrating the history of London and its people, including Docklands. To request a search or to order transparencies, prints or slides telephone: 020-7814-5605.
The Museum in Docklands offers a full programme of events for families and adults, including workshops, demonstrations and study days. Services for schools and colleges include object handling, storytelling, evening classes and teachers’ courses and resources. For full details of current programmes telephone: 020-7001-9814.
Further information:
Albanne Spyrou
tel: 0207 814 5503
mob: 07986 660205