Suffolk Museum of the Year Awards

Winners of the Suffolk Museum of the Year Awards 2019, photo by Gary Payne.

I’ve spent the last few months working on the Suffolk Museum of the Year Awards alongside another consultant, Miranda Ellis. We organised the process and ceremony, and promoted the awards to encourage museums to enter and the public to vote for their favourite Object of the Year.

Last week’s award ceremony was a lovely evening, bringing together so many of Suffolk’s museums champions, from dedicated volunteers who do outstanding work running and supporting museums, to stakeholders who lobby for much-needed funding.

It was humbling and inspiring to hear the stories of the winners and their teams, for example:

• the Natural Science Volunteer Team at Ipswich Museum (winners of Volunteers of the Year) whose “tireless effort and dedication to efficiently archiving and cataloguing part of the museum’s collection has meant that collections are properly listed and more accessible”

• Bawdsey Radar, winner of the Small Museum of the Year, which “has seen the most incredible transformation. The presentation is outstanding, and the building and stories contained within have been presented to the standard of a national museum.”

• Lowestoft Maritime Museum, winner of the Family-Friendly Award due to “its marked improvement in engaging families, with a 65% increase in the number of young people that visit the museum.” (quotes from the judges)

What stood out from the evening was the incredible impact that museums have in their communities and the incredible staff, volunteers and trustees that make this happen. It was a treat to have been a part of.