The Migration Museum at The Workshop – telling stories of movement to and from Britain in fresh and engaging ways at our dynamic London venue.

We stage an adventurous programme of exhibitions, events and education workshops at our museum, housed in The Workshop, an arts and community space just off Albert Embankment.

The Migration Museum at The Workshop is located at 26 Lambeth High Street, London, SE1 7AG. We are open Wednesday–Sunday, from 11am to 5pm, with late opening until 9pm on the last Thursday of each month.

What’s on and how to find us>

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What's on

  • Imprints 2017: Migration Museum Project Fundraising Walk

    © Migration Museum Project

    October 14, 2017

    Join the Migration Museum Project on Saturday 14 October for our second annual fundraising walk across London. Read more

  • Rediscovering Rosemary Lane: Irish Migrants in Victorian London

    October 12, 2017

    This guided walk unearths the lives of Irish migrants in Whitechapel and Wapping in the mid-nineteenth century. Read more

  • No Turning Back: Seven Migration Moments that Changed Britain

    © Migration Museum Project

    September 20, 2017

    A new exhibition from the Migration Museum exploring seven migration moments throughout history that changed Britain through art, photography, graphics, quotes and stories. Read more

  • Journeys to Oxford

    June 12, 2017

    The Migration Museum Project has contributed to a community exhibition celebrating the vibrant contributions made to the cultural life of Oxford by those who have travelled to the city to live, work, visit and study. Read more

Exhibitions

  • Call me by my name: stories from Calais and beyond

    © Paul Evans, The Red Carpet

    Call me by my name: stories from Calais and beyond explores the complexity and human stories behind the current migration crisis, with a particular focus on the Calais camp. Read more

  • 100 Images of Migration

    © Christian Sinibaldi

    A collection of diverse images by professional and amateur photographers that together tell a compelling story about what migration means to people across the UK. Read more

  • Keepsakes

    © Siddharta Arbelaez Caldas and Aditi Anand

    Working with communities and individuals, we are exploring the nature and importance of personal keepsakes in telling migration stories. Read more

  • Adopting Britain at Southbank Centre

    © Tim Smith

    We are very proud to have been a part of the Adopting Britain exhibition, curated by Southbank Centre in partnership with Counterpoints Arts, during its run at Royal Festival Hall from April to September 2015. Read more

  • Germans in Britain

    Explore the rich and fascinating history of German migrants to Britain in our pop-up exhibition, which has toured extensively throughout the UK.
    Read more

  • RE·THINK Migration

    We collaborated with the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich to explore the theme of migration with visitors from June – November 2015.
    Read more

Latest
blog

  • Home, 2010 and 2017

    In 2010, Simon James took a series of photographs for an exhibition which he called Home, 2010. This was a series of portraits with handwritten answers to a questionnaire alongside the photos. The questionnaire asked the subjects of their photos a series of factual questions –name, home town, nationality, part of London they lived in,… Read more

  • How long, o Lord, how long?

    How long do you have to live somewhere before you are accepted as belonging there? A friend moved to a village in Devon 30 years ago and is now leader of the parish council. But she regularly finds her proposals or decisions challenged by another council member, who invariably begins his sarcastic intervention, ‘Well, as… Read more

  • The new “respectable racism” needs to be challenged more

    A new exhibition has opened in Roast restaurant in London’s Borough Market, founded by a distinguished friend – and generous supporter – of the Migration Museum Project, Iqbal Wahhab. Here Iqbal talks about the circumstances that provided the unfortunate inspiration for the exhibition. No one really knows what’s going to happen post-Brexit. But we do… Read more

  • No Turning Back – diverging paths in Britain’s migration history

    Standing at a crossroads What have been the pivotal moments, the forks in the road, the lines in the sand in the history of migration in this country? And was the referendum on 23 June 2016 one of those moments? The pivotal moments in a person’s, or a country’s, life are always compelling hooks to… Read more

  • ‘Evil May Day’: a 500th anniversary

    One of the clear highlights of our ‘Imprints’ walk last October (to judge from the feedback of walkers) was Bill Bingham’s rendition of the ‘Strangers’ speech from Sir Thomas More. Bill, a tireless friend of the Migration Museum Project and the mastermind behind the video tent in our current exhibition of Call Me By My… Read more

  • Stories from the Soho Road

    After Khalid Masood’s attack on Westminster last week, both Birmingham and Islam were singled out for critical comment in some of the nation’s press – Birmingham being once again branded the UK’s prime jihadist recruitment centre, and Islam criticised for its callousness, as evidenced by the photograph of a young Muslim woman walking past one… Read more

  • Nations divided: how to teach the history of partition

    Waiting for the midnight hour This year marks the 70th anniversary of Indian Independence. On 15 August 1947, ‘At the stroke of the midnight hour,’ as India’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, sonorously proclaimed, ‘when the world sleeps, India will awake to life and freedom.’ And so it did, but it awoke too to the… Read more

Education & resources

  • Our Migration Story

    This website draws on the research of over 60 historians based in universities and historical institutions and presents the often untold stories of the generations of migrants who came to and shaped the British Isles.

  • England’s Immigrants 1330 – 1550

    These lessons introduce pupils to the results of the research project into medieval immigration using extensive government records from the time.

Latest
news

  • The Partition Museum opens in Amritsar, Thursday 17 August

    “The Partition Museum is the world’s first memorial to the Partition of the subcontinent, opening 70 years on from the traumatic creation of independent India and Pakistan. In one of the greatest migrations in human history, 18 million people moved, amid escalating chaos and violence, to either side of a hastily demarcated border. This is a memorial… Read more

  • Martin Roth, 1955–2017

    Truly sorry to hear the news, earlier this week, of the death of Martin Roth, ex-director of the V&A, a distinguished friend of the MMP and a huge source of support, sound advice and inspiration to us, as he was to many in the arts and heritage world. The German foreign minister described him well… Read more

  • Video: Annual Lecture 2017 – Gary Younge on why global capital respects no borders, but people must

    © Lisa Carpenter

    Journalist and author Gary Younge looks at how immigration is understood in the current age and what the consequences are in terms of migration, social anxiety and democracy. Read more

  • Migration Museum at The Workshop launch party

    © Roland Williams

    On the 10th May 2017 we were delighted to welcome 500 supporters to celebrate the opening of our new venue, Migration Museum at The Workshop. Guests enjoyed a wonderful performance by Yasmin Kadi,  as well as talks by distinguished friends, Lord Alf Dubs and George Alagiah.   Migration Museum at The Workshop Launch from Migration… Read more

  • Street Orchestra London performs at our new venue

    Join us for a free performance of migration themed music by Street Orchestra London this Sunday at 2:30pm with 100 Images of Migration as the gallery backdrop. Read more

  • Migration Museum at The Workshop

    © Roland Williams

    We are delighted to announce the launch of our dynamic new venue, Migration Museum at The Workshop. Read more

  • The Migration Museums Network

    The Migration Museum Project is excited to announce the launch of the Migration Museums Network. Read more

Learn more

  • Robert Tombs on English migration history

    © Migration Museum Project

    On 18 November 2015, Robert Tombs delivered our second Annual Lecture in partnership with the London School of Economics and Political Sciences. Listen to the audio podcast. Read more

  • Michael Rosen on The Languages of Migration

    Michael Rosen speaking in a thoughtful pose, gesturing with one hand, holding his notes in the other

    Audio podcast and transcript of Michael Rosen’s The Languages of Migration talk for the Migration Museum Project – London School of Economics inaugural annual Public Lecture. Read more

  • 100 Images of Migration Online Gallery

    © Tim Smith

    First shown at Hackney Museum, our exhibition is now viewable as an online gallery. Read more