Llangollen Museum will be closed over Christmas and New Year, and then for some housekeeping tasks.
We will close on Wednesday December 23 and re-open on Saturday January 16 2027. From Tuesday November 3 the opening times will change slightly. On Tuesdays, the Museum will close at 3pm instead of 4pm – all other days will remain the same.
Our talks programme continues. On Monday November 2, Professor Tim Grady, from Chester University, will give a talk entitled The Other Dead – Britain and the Memory of the Two World Wars. There will be no talk in December or January, but in February Professor Howard Williams will give his second talk about Wat’s Dyke, to accompany his exhibition in the gallery (see below). Watch our Facebook page for details of this.
Looking further ahead in 2027, on Wednesday March 31 Dr Jonathan Worton will give a presentation about the Civil War, and on Wednesday April 28, Julian Davies will talk about Stone Lifting, a sport rooted in ancient traditions. All talks start at 7pm at the Museum. Tickets are £3 at the door with refreshments provided. Do get the dates in your diaries - we hope to see you there!
The next exhibition in the Janet Wakefield Gallery at the Museum will start at the beginning of November and will consist of pictures and sculptures depicting Myths and Legends from the area around the Dee Valley. This exhibition is being put on in collaboration with the Dory Gallery.
December will see Gary Jones display some of his fantastic wildlife photography, and this will continue to be shown after we re-open in January. In February 2027, Professor Howard Williams will mount an exhibition about Wat’s Dyke. Other artists who will be exhibiting in 2027 include Sarah Chapman and friends (March), Lyn Hodnett (April), Clint Chaloner (May) and Grace Hughes (June).
Our current window display shows some spooky tales from Llangollen and the area. November’s window will show some of the local stories of the First World War and then we will have our Christmas display in December. In 2027, subjects will include the Ladies of Llangollen and a Medieval themed display.
Our present Item of the Month, an Elizabeth I coin, will be followed by a Flanders Poppy in November, and then December will feature a Christmas card theme. Items for 2027 will include medieval spindle whorls and a stock book used at the tannery and leather works that was formerly on Church Street.
The Clwyd and Dee Valley Young Archaeologists Club (YAC), based at the Museum will be holding their final two meetings of 2026. November’s session will take place on the 26th of the month, with the theme still to be decided. For membership details or further queries please email cdv.yac@gmail.com.
Under our Welsh Government funded programme to improve access to, and care of, items in our collection, via digitisation and conservation, we have carried out a number of different strands of work. Some are behind the scenes and some have resulted in new displays.
Our Dreamoc ‘holographic’ display cabinet is presently showing an interim display depicting 3D imagery of a small number of items. In November, the full display will be implemented, allowing visitors to view 21 items in 3D, along with full descriptions. Alongside that will be two Victorian stereographic viewers for visitors to try. These were the 19th century equivalent of Meta Quest, and allow visitors to view 3D photographs of scenes around Llangollen, that we hold in our collection, as they were in the late 1800s.
Another new addition will be a touchscreen timeline display, available in the Museum and on our website, helping visitors to understand where items in our collection, and local landmarks, originated – both in time and space. This will be installed later this year or early in 2027.
The digitisation of the microfilm records that we hold of the Llangollen Advertiser newspaper, that are not yet available digitally, has begun. They will be made available on our website, giving everyone a chance to access news stories from 1911 to 1913 and 1920 to 1944.
Next spring, Llangollen Museum will be holding two open events for anyone that may be interested in becoming a volunteer, or indeed just have an interest in what goes on behind the scenes at a small independent museum.
* Watch our Facebook page and llanblogger, early in 2027, for details.
Llangollen Museum has been an accredited museum for 14 years. Accreditation is run as a partnership between Arts Council England, the Welsh Government, Museums Galleries Scotland, and the Northern Ireland Museums Council. It is the official industry standard that evaluates and certifies whether a museum or gallery is well-run, cares for its collections properly, and provides a safe, engaging experience for visitors.
Due to backlogs during Covid, and more recently, closure for Museum improvements the Museum was re-awarded Provisional Accreditation, but now have our full re-accreditation visit on Friday November 6. We hope very much that we will be able to keep our fully accredited status.
For all of the latest information about what is happening at the Museum, do keep an eye on our Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/p/Llangollen-Museum-100057657969751/.
Finally, as with many voluntary organisations, we need more volunteers, especially to cover the weekends. If you want to be more involved with the history of the area, and become a volunteer at the Museum, please contact our manager Gill Smith at gilliansmith2@hotmail.co.uk or on 07516 023524.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.