A School trip to Sheffield

This museum is properly called Weston Park Museum but is also the Sheffield City Museum and the name change is fairly recent. I visited in late 2017, long before any ideas about blogging or museum activism or accessibility entered my mind. So all of my personal notes on this museum focus on other areas of museology. As a result I might have missed things. Please let me know!

Location

Western Bank, Sheffield, S10 2TP

Cost Breakdown

The museum is free.

There is a donation box between the shop and the entrance. I encourage all that can afford to do so to donate a few pounds or buy something in the shop/cafe to help support the institution.

Ease of Access

Sheffield Museum is a grand old building with columns, carved pediments, and other imposing architectural features. These are common in older English museums. They look like Greek or Roman temples most of the time. At least on the outside. Inside they are very welcoming so don’t let the facade discourage your visit.

There is a long shallow ramp leading up from Weston Park to the main entrance but you can also enter through the street-level cafe. The galleries and other public spaces are all on ground level. The only exception is the learning spaces on the first floor. These can be accessed by lift or stairs near the front entrance.

Sheffield Tour Notes

This museum is a typical City Museum in the UK. That means it tries to cater to local families and schools. As a result there are two galleries dedicated to local history – one archaeological and one social. Along side that there is a temporary gallery, an extensive art gallery, a natural history gallery, and a permanent exhibition about life in the arctic. This last one exists because the museum had a taxidermied polar bear and work with local community groups showed that the people of Sheffield wanted to know more about the bear.

When I visited the temporary gallery space had a doll house exhibit from the V&A. This had an auditory, story telling component that I found difficult to process.

For children the social history, arctic, and natural history galleries had fun interactives and toys. These included building an igloo, crawling ‘underground’, and running a butcher’s shop.

There were interactives in each of the galleries ranging from interactive maps to lift the flap to find out more! To my observation they were all in working order but a few where rough around the edges from age. I had a lot of fun in the arctic exhibition trying to construct a small igloo.

Unlike in the Hockey Hall of Fame there are small folding stools tucked into the galleries for individuals who need a break. This could be because the museum is old enough to predate ideas about access and therefore there are not easy preexisting spaces for gallery seating. I like this solution. There were also large print books of interpretation kept above the folding stools. The museum was not busy enough for me to need them but anyone who struggles with small print would benefit from them.

The cafe was fairly standard with slightly overpriced food and drink. They discouraged picnicking but the school area had a few picnic benches. During warmer days the cafe has an outdoor patio and there are plenty of benches and trees in the neighbouring park.

There is an access page on the website.

Here they have information about parking, toilets, and even a social story PDF. It’s fairly comprehensive and the employees of Sheffield Museum are very friendly if there is anything missing.

Score out of 10: 8

For those of you new to Museum Spaces I rate every museum out of 10 with 10 being so remarkable as to elicit disbelief and 1 being so terrible as to elicit anger

The not so brilliant:

1. The arctic: This exhibition is really well executed… if you are three feet tall and below the age of ten. I was too tall and too old to enjoy any of the interactives in this section. This is because the museum was catering to school groups and young families. They run the risk of alienating older audiences.

The Remarkable

1. The arctic: I have a bit of insider knowledge here Weston Park Museum was all set to get rid of the bear but they listened to their community when redesigning the galleries and the people overwhelmingly wanted to know more about the bear. The museum showed their commitment to their community by going above and beyond when researching the bear and the arctic.
2. The folding chairs: Like I said above this is a good solution for older and smaller museums and galleries.

I enjoyed my time in Sheffield

If I ever get back to the city I would love to head back into Weston Park Museum to see what is happening these days. There is something very nice about the feel of the city museum. I really didn’t spend enough time there! Darn constraints of a school visit!

Have you ever been? let me know what you think of Sheffield’s Weston Park Museum in the comments below!

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