No ‘Rogue Traders’ allowed

The Smoking Room, Cecil Higgins Art Gallery & Bedford Museum

Walking through the Victorian Mansion (as it was), you would have been forgiven for thinking that the oak panels in the smoking room were an original feature of the house. In fact they were designed by the architect Norman Shaw for the Partners' Dining Room at 8 Bishopsgate Road, London, the headquarters of Baring Bank & Co Ltd. Before its collapse in the '90s (after employee Nick Leeson lost $1.3 billion dollars in speculative investments), Barings was one of London’s oldest financial institutions and had been trading since 1762, moving into Bishopsgate in 1806 and remaining there until the bank's collapse in 1995.

Originally, the building had been a Georgian style house but over the years it underwent several expansions and refurbishments, including in the 1880s work by Norman Shaw who was employed to redesign the frontage and some of the rooms inside, all in his typical Queen Ann style.


Unfortunately the building was demolished in the 1980s to make way for a wider road and was replaced by a skyscraper. Before the wrecking ball struck the bank donated parts of the building to museums across the country. The Ground Floor waiting room went to the Bowes Museum in County Durham, the Board Room and Ante Room went to Southampton City Art Gallery (where it provides a back drop for Edward Burne-Jones’ ‘Perseus Cycle’), parts of the Banking Hall went to the Museum of London, where it is displayed as a room setting in the Victorian Walk, while the Partners' Dining Room came to Cecil Higgins Art Gallery.

The Partners' Dining Room, 8 Bishopsgate Road

The panelling was installed in the Higgins house in the mid '70s, and although the room was a different shape to the original Dining Room, much was done to avoid altering it to fit.

Back of a piece of panelling with an original label for the 'Luncheon Room'

Now, thirty years later, the panelling has come down, and as carefully as it was put up we have been equally careful taking it down, hiring professional furniture conservators who catalogued each piece, so that when the builders have finished we can reinstall the room and know exactly which piece goes where (much like a jigsaw but with very, very heavy pieces).

Thankfully a lot of the panelling is in large sections (those lifting the sections were obviously not quite as thankful!), apart from the fireplace which seems to be the most complex part with several large sections of marble, iron and wood making up what looks at first viewing like one piece.

The Conservators closely examining the fireplace

The good news is that the panelling is in really good condition, considering its various past lives. All it will need before it is put back is a clean and a polish, leaving it with a secure investment for its future.

Victoria Partridge,
Keeper of Fine and Decorative Art

All hands to the pump - moving the Sharnbrook fire engine

Our 19^th century horse-drawn manual fire engine is one of my favourite objects in the collection here, but definitely proved one of the most challenging to move as part of our big packing project. 

The engine was used by the Sharnbrook Volunteer Fire Brigade, founded by Daniel Hipwell of Stoke Mills, from 1832 until the early 20th century.



The fire engine on display


It was one of the most difficult objects to move because of its size and the fact that it had been on display in a first floor gallery since the early 1980’s. The challenge was how to get it out of the building via some fairly narrow stairs and a small goods lift!

Early on we consulted a specialist removal firm and it was decided that the only feasible solution would be to separate it into its component parts. This would need to be done very delicately to avoid damaging the restored paint work and in order to support the overall structure throughout the operation.



Carefully separating each part, from big...



...to small

We discovered that the engine had been taken apart for some restoration work when it was first displayed at the Museum in 1984. At this time, it had been restored back to its original colours of blue and orange.

The gradual dismantling of the engine was a very time consuming process, each part needing assessment to ensure the support and safety of both the object and those working on it.

First of all, the driving seat and the top section of the engine were lifted off with relative ease. Next, the iron and wood pumping arm mechanism was removed. The really tricky part was removing the hefty wheel axels from underneath the core base unit, which was done with a great deal of care.

Heading to the lift...

To get the larger components of the vehicle out of the building, some of the old display panels and furniture had to be taken apart to access the lift and stairs. We were all grateful that the two main sections of the body of the fire engine just about squeezed into the lift (with millimetres to spare!).

...and onto the movers' vehicle

The fire engine successfully made it into our store and was partially reconnected together, ready and waiting to be redisplayed – perhaps we will avoid placing such a big vehicle on the first floor in the future!

Lydia

How to move a mummy...

Earlier this week we tackled a job that we've been putting off for a while now...packing and moving the museum's mummy.

Actually, to be accurate, it's a mummy case (we checked and it's definitely empty). Unfortunately, we know very little about it. A trawl through our collections records hasn't revealed who donated it to the museum and it's also hard for us to date it. This is partly because, sometime ago, it was given a thick coat of varnish. Although this was probably done to try and protect the surface, the varnish has turned a murky, dark brown colour, through which there are tantalising glimpses of painted decoration.

The idealised face is described on the label as having been 'much re-gilded' and there's a nice rumour that the boys at Bedford Modern School (from whose museum much of the collection here originates) were allowed to practise their gilding skills on it!    



The mummy case


Generally speaking, it's a good idea to try and actually handle an object like this as little possible when moving it, to reduce the risk of causing damage. Opening the display case the mummy has been in for the past few decades, it became clear that removing it entirely would be extremely difficult.

Because we only needed to move the mummy case a short distance by hand into temporary storage, we decided the best option was to pack it in situ. There's often no 'right' or 'wrong' choice in collections problems like this, instead it's best to think in terms of what works for the particular challenges you're facing. Had we been moving the mummy case offsite by vehicle, we would almost certainly have made a different decision.

Firstly, we wrapped the mummy case in a special breathable fabric to protect its surface.

Wrapping it up

    
The next step was to pad out the inside of the display case with wadges of acid-free tissue, helping to stop any movement.

Making up the tissue wadges

Er, whose hand is that?

After that, we put glass tape and corrugated plastic across the surface of the glass, to add an extra layer of protection (both for us and for the object!).



The finished article - ready to go!

 The display case itself has its own wheels. As the mummy case was now well padded and protected, it was simply a case of wheeling it away...just a short distance to where it would join the rest of the archaeology collection in temporary storage while the redevelopment of the Art Gallery & Museum takes place.

Off to the stores

The mummy case was one of the last really awkward objects to move before we hand over the museum to the builders, and there's a definite sense of relief that the end of the packing project is in sight!