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PRS appointed designer of Our Country Lives Exhibiton for the Museum of English Rural Life

The Museum of English Rural Life is planning a major overhaul of their display 'Our Country Lives', and GuM have been appointed as exhibition designers for the project. The Museum is seeking support from the HLF, with the new display complete by December 2015. GuM is working with BT Museum Consultancy and Thomas Manss & Co.
The design will transform through a redisplay the Museum of English Rural Life to engage visitors dynamically in the stories of rural life in the past. This will enable them to explore through the collections contemporary issues around environmentalism as well as local and global sustainability. The project will energise the way a new generation engages with rural heritage through innovative, co-created interpretation and new approaches to audience development for MERL.
MERL holds a unique position among UK museums of rural history as a result of the scope, depth and content of its collection and their importance in reflecting local, regional and national aspects of our rural heritage. The MERL collection has resonance and significance to varied users and audiences; many parts of the collection are, by definition, of local interest to areas near to Reading or to smaller communities across the country in the areas from which is it was acquired. Notwithstanding the Museum’s aim to be national in scope, it was farmers, rural craftsmen and rural communities and families local to Reading who provided rich territory for fieldwork, research and collecting as the Museum’s profile was established in the 1950s and 60s.

Our Country Lives