Museums n'That

Oh no. Oh dear. What's happening. We don't like it. A little news: that Meg over there has gone and got herself a new job! The sausage. So is this the last episode of Museums n'That ever? Maybe. Do we love you all deeply for the support you've given us throughout the last 6 series? Absolutely. Did Danny listen to us and ask DPD to change his delivery route? 100%. Thanks so much. Museums n'That might be back. But in the meantime, you are always very welcome to stay in touch - @saralmerritt, @MuseumMeg and @LeedsMuseums on ye olde Twitter. Over and out x Support the show

Hayley Cropper's anorak! Here we go gang - signing off this series is self-confessed conservator dork Kloe Rumsey, Conservator at the People's History Museum in Manchester. Kloe exercises extreme patience this episode as we ask her all of our burning questions about conservation. Are there big sciencey chemicals involved? How do you deal with the responsibility of trying fix extremely precious artefacts? And the big one - the question we've always known would come up, in a way: What does Hillary Clinton smell like? Kloe also hosts the brilliant podcast The C Word - The Conservators' Podcast. If you like this, you'll absolutely like that, so give it a listen. If you liked the episode, listen, subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and all the usual podcast suspects. Support the show

Sustainability! Climate! Museums! Longshore Drift! All the main hitters. Talking us through it all is the powerhouse that is Sara Kassam (2 Sara's and a Meg - you're welcome) the benign environmental dictator at UK Sport and previous Sustainability Lead at ye olde V&A. Sara is also Sustainability Advisor at the Museums Association, and most importantly of all, has great taste in snacks. If you liked the episode, listen, subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and all the usual podcast suspects. Support the show

What do you get when you mix a hotel breakfast with the Chief Exhibitor at the Tower of London? A really good podcast episode. Not only are we at the Tower! of! London! (Meg's favourite place in the world) this episode, but we have the absolute pleasure of talking to Chief Exhibitor Nivek Amichund. And opening his post. Nivek talked us through how he got to be in this whopper of a role, life living at the Tower and ghost stories and quirks from around the site. We had the absolute best time. Thanks Nivek - see you at the next breakfast buffet. If you liked the episode, listen, subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and all the usual podcast suspects. Support the show

The most butt heavy episode we've had yet. And that's saying something. Today's wonderful guest is Amelia Silver, a Curating for Change Fellow working with the Thackray Museum to make museums more accessible for people with disabilities. Amelia tells us all about her route into her role, including lots about her own disability and how that lead to her working on this project. We get into what museums could be doing better, their new exhibition Private Parts and where to look for sex toys in Leeds City Centre. Variety! It's the butt plug of life. If you liked the episode, listen, subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and all the usual podcast suspects. Ps. At the end of this episode, we do our usual thanks to Tim Bentley for doing our theme music, and to Alex Finney for doing our... theme music. Al did our cover artwork! Silly sausages. Support the show

A big ol' love letter to plants, this one. Dried ones especially. And our first returning guest! Clare Brown of S2 E7 fame is back to tell us all about herbaria. Herbarium? Herbariums. Dried plant specimens, stored in our collection at Leeds Discovery Centre. Why should we collect them? How do we dry them? Stick your nose in a female plant, and what does it smell like? Big thanks to Clare, and big thanks to you for listening. If you liked the episode, listen, subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and all the usual podcast suspects. Support the show

Oh, hiya! Series 6 it is then kids. Sassy Holmes is the Programme Officer at the Brontë Parsonage Museum in lovely Haworth, so we invited her to come and teach us the wily, windy ways of literature's #1 family. We find out about the objects they have in the museum, including ones found hidden in the walls - we cannot - and hear some frankly cracking ghost stories too. Sassy also tells us all about their new exhibition, The Brontë's and the Wild, which you can read more about here: https://www.bronte.org.uk/whats-on/1267/the-brontes-and-the-wild And, y'know. Go to Haworth guys. If you've enjoyed listening, then subscribe on all the usual podcast suspects and leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. Ta very much. Support the show

It’s us! We’re back. And for our 6th series of Museums n’That, we’ve lined up some extremely very good museum-y guests to tell us all about the weird and wonderful things they love the most. We’re talking Brontës, we’re talking climate change, we’re talking conservation to name a few – and guys, we’ve done it, we’ve gone and bloody done it: we’re talking the Tower of London. And naturally we also end up talking about what kind of curry we’d be, how much we love the Thames Clipper and what Hillary Clinton smells like. But the jury’s still out on that one. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts to be the first to hear the new series of Museums n’That – coming to your lugholes very soon. Support the show

Surprise! It's about time we treated you to another spesh, and when better to treat you than at Christmas. Visitor Assistant Steve Scholey pulls out all the festive stops in this episode, which was recorded at the effortlessly Christmassy Temple Newsam. Find out what the rapscallions that lived there did to celebrate the season 500 years ago - yule logs were real logs, guys - and listen to us, the modern day rapscallions, eat some delicious Ecclefechan tarts. Ecclefechan. We also get shouted at by around 30 young children. Merry Christmas, gang! Listen, subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and all the usual podcast suspects. Support the show

For the final episode in this series we nipped back down the canal to (potentially the second greatest city in the world) Liverpool. Where we met Ranmalie! Dr Ranmalie Jayawardana is the Community Participation Lead at the International Slavery Museum and Maritime Museum at National Museums Liverpool. She's currently working on the Waterfront Transformation Project and is doing lots of very important things to make sure local communities feel connected to and represented in the museum. We also hear quite a bit about Ranmalie's sausage sandwich. Huge thanks to all of our guests and listeners this series! If you've enjoyed listening in, then subscribe on all the usual podcast suspects and leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. You're the best. Support the show

Dan Vo: a vibe. A VERY exciting episode this week, as we interview self-titled Museum Queerator Dan Vo at Queer Britain - the UK’s first LGBTQ+ museum. Dan talks us through the stories that the museum tells, why the work they’re doing is so important, and the impact it's had so far. Basically, how to museum good. Go and visit! Right now! Go go go! If you enjoy the episode, subscribe on all the usual podcast platforms and give us a review on Apple Podcasts. There’s a good sport. Support the show

Who loves cream soda? Ethan Crabtree loves cream soda. This episode, lovely Ethan shares his experience of volunteering as a young person in the award winning Preservative Party - still going strong! - at Leeds City Museum, and essentially just spends 45 minutes proving that all museums should be run by young people. We learn about their upcoming exhibition, Overlooked, and hear about the time he broke every museum rule ever at the Liverpool Beatles Museum. If you enjoy the episode, subscribe on all the usual podcast platforms and give us a review on Apple Podcasts. Bless and thank you! Support the show

Mum, we made it to the V&A! Meg and Sara embark on an epic adventure to the Big Smoke this episode, and end up in the Fashioning Masculinities exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum. Where they spent a lot of time studying Harry Styles' footwear. Curator - and ex Leeds Museums and Gallleries alumni - Rosalind McKever talks us through the exhibition, what it's like working at the V&A, and her list of art history boyfriends. The Fashioning Masculinities exhibition is open until 6 November, and you can buy tickets here. If you enjoy the episode, subscribe on all the usual podcast platforms and give us a review on Apple Podcasts and you'll be simply the best. Better than all the rest. Support the show

In this episode we chat to Assistant Community Curator Patrick Bourne about the history of Kirkstall Abbey: the hottest 870 year old you've ever seen. What's been excavated here? What's been the haps for the last 8 centuries? Where did the monks go for a poo? We also find out about the ghostly goings on at Abbey House Museum, and write a little love letter to peshwari naan. The Kirkstall Lives exhibition we chat about is fantastic, and open until December 2022. If you enjoy the episode, subscribe on all the usual podcast platforms and give us a review on Apple Podcasts and we'll love you for at least 870 years. That's a promise. Support the show

We're back! Kicking off series 5 - and getting stung by a bee in the process which we did not arrange - is corker of a guest, Joe Vaughan. Joe is the Digital Editor at Reading Museum and the Museum of English Rural Life, and he popped on the pod to talk to us about being a pretty big cheese in the world of social media (and everything that comes with it). Please note that although it may seem like it, this podcast is not sponsored by the Zadar Museum of Ancient Glass or Shed Cafe's sandwiches. This one's a cracking start to a great series - subscribe on all the usual podcast suspects to be the first to hear every episode, and give us a review on Apple Podcasts if you fancy being fantastic. Support the show

We’ve only gone and recorded another series. All hail series 5! This time around, we've been to London, we’ve been to Liverpool, we’ve been to Reading – and of course, the greatest of them all. We've been to Leeds. Expect chats about all things museums, but like, only the interesting bits: bloodletting monks, Harry Styles at the V&A, and absolute units. If that sounds like a bit of you then subscribe to Museums n’That wherever you get your podcasts, to be the first to hear Series 5, coming very soon. Support the show

Wafting a load of rhubarb farts into our final episode of the series is Rob Scargill, Interpretation Developer at the National Railway Museum. We've done trains before, sure, but we haven't done interpretation now have we guys. Rob explains how everything (literally, everything) you experience in a museum is thought out - from the stories you tell about an object to the colour light you shine on it. This episode also features a live moderate disaster, when we accidentally melted Sara's headphones. As she was wearing them. Huge thanks to all of our guests and lovely listeners this series! If you've enjoyed listening to our silly little questions, then subscribe on all the usual podcast suspects and leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. Support the show

Our guest this week is Visitor Assistant and harbinger of exotic fruits Carmen Webbe. Carmen talks to Meg and Sara about black artists and subjects on display at Leeds Art Gallery, her opinion on works and exhibitions and, most importantly, her experience as a black woman working in a public facing role at an art gallery. Links to things talked about if you'd like to find out more: Five, by Lubaina Himid (which we say is in our collection - it isn't! Silly us. It's on long loan to Leeds Art Gallery). Melita, by Ronald Ossory Dunlop Visit Ashley Holmes' website There's a case study on the MyLearning website about Retribution by Edward Armitage Listen, subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and all the usual podcast suspects. Support the show

SHIPWRECKS. FINALLY. And not just any shipwreck. Meg and Sara take a trip down the canal to Liverpool, where they chat with Ian Murphy, Head of the Merseyside Maritime Museum. Ian walks us through their exhibition 'Titanic and Liverpool: the untold story' and we find out about the objects they have relating to Titanic, how collecting from a wreck site works and some of the (sad) stories they tell at the museum. We also find out about the time Meg threw a piece of fish at the Longleat river boat. Find out more about the Titanic and Liverpool exhibition and have a look through their Titanic collection online. Listen, subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and all the usual podcast suspects. Support the show

200 years old we are. 200! years! old! This year Leeds Museums & Galleries celebrates a (very) big birthday, and Projects Curator Catherine Robins has been party-planning the whole shebang. Find out how to open an exhibition with an army of excellent volunteers, what happened when Leeds was bombed in 1941 and what celery has to do with a budgie called Papa Guy. Do not expect to find out what a fossil is, because we literally do not know. Find out more about our 200th Birthday Listen, subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and all the usual podcast suspects. Support the show