Museum of London Ceramics and Glass project
Objective 3. Making the collection accessible through events, study days and on-line access
Events and study days
The programme of events and study days over the last three months of the project provided an opportunity to trial different types of events and to evaluate their effectiveness for the future. Five events were held: two specialist evenings, two adult open days and one family day. In addition, a community project with a local school was carried out by the Museum's community liaison officer.
All the events were evaluated with questionnaires to participants and the results of these showed very satisfied or satisfied ratings from over 80% of the participants questioned. The family event had a 100% satisfaction rating. As expected, the different audiences showed quite distinct preferences. The specialists preferred tours and the opportunity to 'browse' around the store while the non-specialists enjoyed the tours but also found the lecture or demonstration that was offered a key part of the visit. Most negative comments were regarding the facilities and labelling; some of these have now been addressed.
The community project was held at both the store and at the participating school, the Beatrice Tate Special School in Tower Hamlets. The pupils, aged between 11-15, worked with an artist, commissioned for the project, to produce their own clay pots inspired by objects from the collection. In particular they explored how different patterns were made through mark-making techniques. The finished pieces were displayed in the store during one of the open days, and then at the school. The pupils and teachers were extremely enthusiastic about the project, finding the visit to the store a 'great experience... to actually see and touch pots ...'.
Several specialist groups have requested visits to the collection over the next few months as part of conferences or study tours. We will assess how to continue with events for the general public. The archaeological archive, also based at Mortimer Wheeler House, holds quarterly open days; the family day, held in conjunction with this worked well and may be the best way to continue with these events.
The collection has been featured in a number of specialist publications and Web sites, and will appear in the next issue of the Museum's Archaeology Matters which has a circulation of 4000. The launch of the Web site will be announced to specialist groups and on the Museum's home page.
Web site
(www.museumoflondon.org.uk/ceramics)
The project team held initial discussions about the structure and aims of the Web site at an early stage in the planning phase. It was agreed to develop a single site as part of the Museum's overall site, which would be relevant to the public, learning and researchers, with an emphasis on access to the primary catalogue and digital resources. The team reviewed progress by other museums with comparable collections, particularly those that had received previous funding from the ICT Challenge Fund, DCF and NOF-digitise. These projects provided valuable models and pointers to the approach to be taken for this collection.
It was agreed to commission the Museum's in-house Systems Team to develop the site. This has strong advantages over commissioning external consultants to carry out the work: the Systems Team could build on systems and skills used for previous projects such as access to the archaeological archive records, they could work very closely with the project team, they would develop our in-house skills and thereby strengthen our capability to deliver future projects and they could work intimately with the in-house database to which they had direct access.
The systems model starts with an extraction routine, which takes information from Multi MIMSY and other internal sources. This information is restructured in a project database. The Web front-end provides access to this database through an ASP interface.
As the unpacking phase of the project progressed and the catalogue records, digital images and authority records were developed, the Web model was itself developed. The concept was then evaluated in a number of focus groups sessions, with general users and specialists. These were very helpful in clarifying the ideas and particularly encouraging us to concentrate on access to the primary records. The site was then developed in the final stages of unpacking and the subsequent two months. It proved very useful for the systems and the project staff to work side by side, as we were able to evolve the concepts.
The final model for the site included interlinked sections for the catalogue, ceramics, glass, makers and publications, which are closely based on the in-house catalogue and authority modules, supported by information about the collection and the project. The effectiveness of the site will continue to be assessed in the following months and the records will be automatically updated as changes are made to the information in the in-house system.
Introduction
Objective 1. New storage facilities and good physical access
Objective 2. Reorganisation and development of the information about the collection
Objective 3. Making the collection accessible through events, study days and on-line access