Museum of the Jewellery Quarter

The Museum of the Jewellery Quarter is a museum at 75-79 Vyse Street in Hockley, Birmingham, England. It is one of the nine museums run by the Birmingham Museums Trust, the largest independent museums trust in the United Kingdom.[1]

Museum of the Jewellery Quarter
Exterior, May 2009
Location in West Midlands
Established1992 (1992)
Location75-79 Vyse Street, Hockley, Birmingham
Coordinates52°29′26″N 1°54′43″W
TypeIndustrial

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interior

In 2008, the Museum of the Jewellery Quarter was named as the third best free tourist attraction in Europe by TripAdvisor, behind the Pantheon in Rome and the National Gallery in London.[2] However an entry charge has since been introduced.[3] The site received 21,646 visitors in 2018.[4]

History

For over 80 years the family-run firm of Smith and Pepper produced gold jewellery from the factory that is now the Museum of the Jewellery Quarter, with very few changes in working practices, equipment or the appearance of the workshop. When the elderly owners retired in 1981, they simply locked the door. Everything was left as it was: tools on benches, overalls hanging on coat hooks, even cups of tea and jars of jam and Marmite.

Collections

The museum opened in 1992[5] originally as the Jewellery Quarter Discovery Centre, as part of the city's Heritage Development Plan.[6][7] It preserves this 'time capsule' of a jewellery workshop[8][9] and also tells the 200-year story of the Birmingham Jewellery Quarter, the centre of the British jewellery industry, and its traditional craft skills. Collections of jewellery exhibited there include coffin fittings.[10] The museum is the starting point of the self-guided walking tour of the Jewellery Quarter.[11]

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References
  1. "West Mids accountants appointed by largest independent museums trust". Commercial News Media. 22 July 2013. Retrieved 4 August 2013.
  2. "TripAdvisor Announces Top 10 Free U.S. Attractions". PR Newswire. 22 May 2008. Archived from the original on 28 September 2008. Retrieved 22 May 2008.
  3. "Museum of the Jewellery Qtr". www.birminghammuseums.org.uk. Retrieved 27 September 2017. Adults £7
  4. "ALVA - Association of Leading Visitor Attractions". www.alva.org.uk. Retrieved 9 October 2019.
  5. Anthony Selwyn Travis, Planning for Tourism, Leisure and Sustainability: International Case Studies, Wallingford, Oxfordshire / Cambridge, Massachusetts: CABI, 2011, OCLC 824727467, p. 227.
  6. Making City Histories in Museums, ed. Gaynor Kavanagh and Elizabeth Frostick, London / Herndon, Virginia: Leicester University, 1998, ISBN 9780718500306, p. 200.
  7. Keith W. Reynard, ed., Directory of Museums, Galleries and Buildings of Historic Interest in the UK, 3rd ed. London: Europa, 2003, ISBN 9780851424736, p. 1029.
  8. Christopher M. Law, Urban Tourism: The Visitor Economy and the Growth of Large Cities, 2nd ed. New York/London: Continuum, 2002, ISBN 9780826449283, p. 76.
  9. Ryan Ver Berkmoes et al., Britain, 4th ed. Footscray, Victoria / Oakland, California: Lonely Planet, 2001, ISBN 9781864501476, p. 470.
  10. English Heritage, Annual Report and Accounts 1998/1999 (1999) p. 15.
  11. Urban Regeneration: Property Investment and Development, ed. Jim Berry, Stanley McGreal and Bill Deddis, New York: Spon, 1993, ISBN 9780419183105, p. 169.
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