Projects

 

Strictly Costume   

The Bowes Museum hosted a Strictly Costume Project during February Half Term which was funded by the Museums Network. The project focused on the 1950s and was inspired by the new textile and costume gallery. The project involved local young people and freelancers, and took 3 days to complete.

During the first two days of the project, the participants worked alongside Lone Helliwell the textile freelancer to create a 1950s costume. The boys printed designs onto t-shirts and the girls made a jive skirt. To begin the project, the students visited the Bowes Museum textile gallery and looked at a variety of patterned textiles. They sketched the patterns and then recreated their own bold design. They made a stencil of their design and printed the motif onto material using fabric paints.

On the final day of the project, the young people participated in a 1950s dance workshop with Shelley O’Brien and Pete Baynes. During the workshops they learnt three dances popular in the 1950s: the Waltz, the Jive and the Rock ’n’ Roll. Following rehearsals, the group hosted a celebration event at the Bowes Museum for family and friends where they performed the dance routines in their handmade costumes.

The Strictly Costume project was very successful. The hard work, enthusiasm and commitment of the young people was outstanding with an excellent outcome. They have learnt new skills and the project has enabled the Museum to develop further links with the local community.        

 
 Raindrops on Roses Parent and child hand painting
The Bowes Museum worked in partnership with Bowes Toddler Group on a four week project with the aim of developing the Museum’s commitment to Early Years Learning. The project was a pilot, funded by the Wallace Collection.
 
The parents and toddlers were given the opportunity to visit the Museum and take part in different activities including: handling sessions, games, craft activities and a Museum trail. The objective of the project was to create a book which could be used by future parents and toddlers visiting the Museum. Once the content of the book was gathered, the final book was designed by a professional design company, Red Square. 
  
Child playing with a toyHow the project was organised:
The project was split into 4 sessions, each lasting 1 hour.
During the first session, participants had the opportunity to look around the toy tales exhibition and then experiment playing with a range of toys from the past. This proved successful and an enjoyable activity for both parents and toddlers. In the second session, participants had the opportunity to be inspired by the Museum’s famous Silver Swan, and then create models and paintings around it. Feedback was very positive stating that the activities were enjoyable and suited to the children’s age. During the third session, participants followed a museum trail and took photographs of objects in the Museum which they wanted to include in the book. In the final session, the participants created captions to include alongside the photographs in the book. This was really beneficial as the parents came up with interesting and varied questions.

 

The book:
The book is entitled 'Toddle Trail at the Bowes Museum'. It is a fun and informative trail, designed for use by parents and toddlers visiting the Museum. The book contains thirteen key items within the Museum collection; each has a ‘fun fact’ and a question for the children to answer when they find the object. The book is A4 and easily portable. The pages are also plastic coated for durability and cleanliness.
 
Explore the Museum treasures using the Toddle Trail available now at Reception.
 
Parent comments:
“We have really enjoyed the sessions”
“Really enjoyed all sessions, Very organised”
 

Intergenerational Project
 
The Bowes Museum participated in an intergenerational project bringing together Cotherstone School Year 5 and 6 children with Beaconsfield Court Care Home residents. The project was a pilot, funded by the Wallace Collection. Meeting between residents and children at Beaconsfield Court Care Home


The children were given the opportunity to visit the residents of the Care Home and listen to them retell stories from their childhood, focusing specifically on Barnard Castle and the surrounding area. Both the children and residents really enjoyed the experience. Once the children returned to the school they worked with Löne, a professional textile artist. Each child designed and made a panel to contribute to large scale class tapestry retelling the residents stories.

To celebrate the completion of the tapestry, the children were invited back to the Beaconsfield Court Care Home to enjoy refreshments with the residents. The event was enjoyable and a good time was had!

Once upon a time children and young people from Teesdale School and Montalbo Primary set about working on a very special project. They worked long and hard with artists and sculptors and made many beautiful things. They created animals from willow and set fairytales in clay, they sculpted a musical caterpillar and even carved a magnificent wooden chair, and when the work was finished, there, in the grounds of The Bowes Museum, a Story Garden was made.


 

The Story Garden
 

During the 2006/07 academic year, The Bowes Museum worked in partnership with Teesdale School through the MLA Learning Links Placement to create a space in the grounds of the Museum in which to tell stories. Delivering the project was an organic process which was very much dependent upon the design ideas of the young people involved. Students from years 8 to 10 contributed to the project and as a result, attended a series of artist-led workshops that complimented the natural theme they wanted for The Story Garden.

In February 2007 the Teesdale students worked with Ruth Thompson from Sylvan Skills to create withie (willow) sculptures and installations based on the Museum’s collections. Later on in this month they also had the opportunity to make fairytale inspired clay tiles with artist Phil Townsend. These tiles have subsequently been inset into the garden’s audience seating.

With funding from the North East Museum’s Regional Hub a multi-sensory element was added to the garden. Teesdale pupils worked with sound sculptor Paddy Burton over two days to turn a huge tree trunk into a musical caterpillar which works in the same way as a xylophone. These three workshops not only provided the young people with new learning experiences, there were also opportunities to develop their team work and problem solving skills.

I thought it was fun and instead of doing the same thing we did different activities to keep us engaged. (Jemma).

 


The Storyteller’s Chair

A common suggestion from the Teesdale students was for the garden to have a central storyteller’s chair. As a result the Museum established another partnership with Montalbo Primary School and Seaham-based sculptor David Gross to design, carve and assemble a magnificent wooden chair inspired by the Year 3 and 4 pupils’ favourite objects in the Museum.

 

With The Story Garden complete an official opening was organised on Sunday 10 June 2007 to celebrate the children and young people’s work and achievements. Everyone who was involved in the project attended the event where storyteller Malcolm Green regaled them with his stories of the natural world.

The Story Garden has been a successful, enjoyable project which has opened the door to new Literacy opportunities in The Bowes Museum. Two storytelling focus weeks have been planned for primary schools in the autumn term and the story theme continues into next year’s Learning Links project with Greenfield School – more details on this exciting collaboration to follow!

To be kept informed about The Bowes Museum please click here
 

 

The Cloth of Tales

 

The Cloth of Tales is a collection of textile panels created by a class of year 7 pupils at Greenfield School Community & Arts College in Newton Aycliffe. The eight month long project was funded by Museums, Libraries and Archives North East and the Durham Education Business Partnership in support of the Learning Links Programme.
 
The Cloth of Tales follows on from the success of the Story Garden, part of the Learning Links programme in 2006. The Museum has a special garden where a throne-like story chair can be found. The Cloth of Tales is the indoor complement to the Story Garden.   Visitors can choose a panel and read the story that accompanies its textile illustration. It is a resource for the Museum that will be very useful when working with primary school children especially.
The pupils from Greenfield School toured the Museum searching for a range of treasures. Once they had found the one they were looking for they worked in groups to create not only a story inspired by the object but also a design for a fabric collage to illustrate it.
 
A month later, an all day workshop to make the fabric pictures took place. Löne Helliwell, a textile artist and designer, provided expert advice and demonstrations of stitching techniques which helped to give the pupils both confidence and creative ideas. Löne also finished off the panels by edging them and making the housing for looping them onto the metal rods on the stand. The stand was made by local craftsman Christopher Helliwell.
 
The project is a fine example of cross-curricular work, combining the English and Drama and Art and Design departments. It is not easy to fit project work in to an already full timetable and a lot of work was done during lunchtimes and after school sessions. The end result is a tribute to the wonderful efforts of 7K and their teachers, Sharon Simpson and Shirley Douglas of Greenfield School.