IWM London Re-Opening Saturday

I went over Easter and it was like a cattle market.

The one thing I liked was Lord Ashcrofts display of 160+ VC’s and MC’s. I read all the stories and sadly it was the quietest part of the museum. I prefered it as it was. Just my opinion.

I like it.

I have now been twice so far this year and will need another day or two to do it justice.

The WW1 basement is epic.

Moggy

Agree all above.

Took a school group there in October. Bitterly disappointed. New First World Gallery does not work for my students, and the confusing new layout makes it difficult to engage them even by leading a tour myself. (We are a Special Needs School)

Given the expense, faff and bumpf required to set up a school visit, IWM Lambeth is not, in my opinion, worth the effort any more.

Off to Ypres and the Somme tomorrow with students – much more effective!

I’m glad I’m not alone in thinking that they have ruined the museum.
The refit in the 80’s / 90’s was brilliant. It opened up the museum all the way
to the roof. Brightened up the exhibits and modernised the building. The aircraft in the roof were amazing.
Now it’s just a dinghy dark un-inspiring crowded cramped space.
The building quality is suspect too with duck taped step edges and a cracked upper floor surface.

The building needs to give space and compliment the exhibits. Now it overpowers and crowds them out.

Agree about the lack of descriptive labeling.
Should be a large, simply label explaining what it is. Then smaller more detailed labeling if you want it.
Some or most exhibits seem to have no labels at all.

Hate it.

I see the revamped IWM Lambeth is up for ‘Museum of the Year’. I do hope it doesn’t win.

Personally I’d wait a couple of decades until the next remodelling, in the hopes they get it right next time.

Oh, and take a packed lunch. A burger and fries in the caff will set you back £11.50!

From what I have read. I will leave it a month or two before I visit.

Okay, thanks. It must be tucked away in the WWI galleries. As I said, all tickets for the day had long gone by the time I arrived around noon. 🙁

Hi Mike
The Camel is there. You can see it on this video of the MkV Tank being hoisted up in it’s new silly pose
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1kUDc_Tx95g

Oh dear. I was wary when I saw the contrasting images in the BBC report of then and now, but hoped I was wrong…

I don’t suppose they still have those little glass cases? Do they? Don’t tell me they have gone………!

Interestingly a similar battle occurred with the ‘famous’ model battle scenes in the Australian War Memorial (very much a peer collection to the IWM) several of which were kept due to public pressure to do so.

I fear from what I see and hear that the IWM have managed through trying to be cutting edge to have wrecked an excellent 1980s museum display with something that is very very badly done.

I’m reminded of the appalling Canadian war Museum in Ottawa which has an excellent collection (and, unlike the IWM) excellently curated signboards and display cabinets in an architect’s concrete ego folly.

Tellingly, when I visited the CWM had a book on sale about the building, and nothing for the collection it housed.

The IWM could’ve learned from that, but appear to have capped it. Shocking, given the opportunity squandered.

Regards,

I used to go almost weekly to the IWM when I was about 10, some 45 or so years ago. I went back recently to do some research only to find that they had anticipated this and deliberately decided to do the place up and restrict access!

Anyway, I used to go to look at all the little dioramas in glass cases depicting battle scenes, I remember liking the devastation and promptly went home to make similar scenes out of Lego and those little plastic soldiers.

I don’t suppose they still have those little glass cases? Do they? Don’t tell me they have gone………!

James

Another problem with the galleries is that when you get to the end of it, you have to double back the way you came straight into the visitors going the way you’ve just been. As Mike says, no traffic flow.

Brian

Is the Camel there? I didn’t see it, but then I wasn’t one of the privileged few allowed access to the First World War galleries.

Just a few photos
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There might be some jokes about the standard of the Army’s driving looking at this.
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The public clogging the place whilst looking at a video.
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Big case, one model, no explanation.
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Aircraft on wires, you eitherlove or hate the idea, I hate it.

I haven’t been since 2009, I don’t remember it being crowded then. Maybe being newly re-opened attracted a lot of people.
Best wait until the kids go back to school, perhaps ?

I made the trip yesterday, and would agree with Aeronut and Brian’s comments. Dark, cramped, badly labelled, traffic flow through the galleries unworkable, and a selection of exhibits and labeling that give a ‘soundbite’ view of history rather than tell a story. Oh dear! 🙁

I got the impression that the layout and video panels would be ideal for a quiet museum…

The absolute number-one failing of many modern museum layouts…..they work great when they’re quiet!

I was there as well today. Oh dear, how sad, never mind. They tried, bless ’em but failed miserably. I got there as doors opened and when I left about an hour later, they were queuing outside to get in. They have knocked out the ground floor into the basement for more space but they have added an extra floor just below the roof light. It is dark in the Atrium now, take a torch with you if you want to see, and even darker in the galleries and I agree totally with aeronut2008 about moving around and seeing things in the galleries. No chance. They were handing out free passes for the WWI Galleries but the que was snaking around the ground floor so gave it a miss. They have bits of exhibits hanging over the balconies as if someone hadn’t measured correctly to see if it would fit in the space. Or is that the modern way of displaying objects now. Oh and if you have any baggage, like a heavy camera bag, see into getting the services of a Sherpa because there are a lot of stairs to climb now. 😀 If you are going to go, get there at doors open because any later the place is packed.

I’ll post some piccies tomorrow.

Brian

Well I went and I’m not impressed.
It may have been because it was very busy (when isn’t Lambeth busy?) but the layout of the galleries is awful. Artifacts aren’t labelled in the cabinet, you have to find a panel remote from the object and figure out where the object you are interested in is on the floor plan – that’ if you can see it at all with people standing in front of it. There are a number of video panels running films, unfortunately the people watching them block the movement of others.
I got the impression that the layout and video panels would be ideal for a quiet museum but it just doesn’t work for the IWM Lambeth with its crowds. The edges of the galleries around the atrium are dead ends and not really wide enough for a two-way flow with the exhibits in the gaps of the pillars supporting a floor under the roof and the exhibit’s labels directly behind you when you look at the exhibits, turn around to read the labels and you collide with someone trying to pass. The shops are so cramped that I didin’t even bother looking at them.
Entering the museum at 1:30 I was told that if I wanted to see the WW1 exhibit I should arrive before 10:00 as there is only a limited number of tickets handed out.
I can see the Architects and the museum being awarded prizes, its that bad, as for me, I won’t be returning.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-28322652

DAI