The Migration Museum received funding from The National Lottery Heritage Fund to support the development of a dispersed Migration Collection, in advance of our move to our permanent home in the City of London in 2028. Our Collections Researcher, Lucy May Maxwell, explains more about the work we’ve been doing with partner organisations to uncover migration stories within existing collections and develop a prototype for people to discover and explore migration stories across the UK.
Lucy May Maxwell, Collections Researcher at the Migration Museum, on a research trip to Leicester Museums. Image: Migration Museum
Earlier this year, as part of the collections research project, the Museum of Cardiff provided a list of migration-related objects that included a Jambiya, a Yemeni dagger, that they have on display. It was donated to the museum by Daoud Salaman. Reading the story of his parents running a cafe in Butetown around the Second World War, I remembered that the Imperial War Museum has a collection of photos of Butetown’s Muslim community at that time. I looked through the photos, and there were Ali and Olive Salaman in their cafe! It was the kind of moment we all get into museums for – the thrill of making connections and putting a face to the name.
This is one of many moments of connection that can leap out when looking at multiple museum collections through a thematic lens. Ali and Olive Salaman’s story would have fitted right into Migration Museum’s past exhibition Taking Care of Business: Migrant Entrepreneurs and the Making of Britain. While there are so many fantastic stories that the Museum has brought together in its previous themed exhibitions, this project gives us the chance to see how they connect to stories held by other museums and by bringing them together digitally, to show all of us a richer picture of Britain’s migration history.
Researching Together
In order to make this project possible, I have been working with volunteers, students and fee-paid researchers to explore the collections of partner museums and archives, as well as to audit past migration-related community heritage projects funded by The National Lottery Heritage Fund. The aim is to uncover migration stories held by other museums, and in turn share them with a wider audience by featuring them in our digital Migration Collection.
In early 2025, students from Goldsmiths, UCL, SOAS, University of Westminster and University of Greenwich researched more than 200 previous NLHF projects and identified both strong community organisations for whom the heritage project is still at the heart of what they do, and other projects that have slipped out of sight due to website redesigns or charity closings. In those cases, we used the Internet Archive to look at snapshots of heritage assets such as oral history interviews.
We are building a digital Migration Collection platform that could safeguard these interviews for the longer term and share them with new audiences. We have started working with digital agency Torchbox to build a prototype platform that will test out how we can rescue heritage assets at risk of being lost and how we can shine a spotlight on others that are held in museum collections.
Staff at all of the partner museums have been very helpful in guiding us towards migration stories that are either on display or in store. Visits to each partner have shown the true scale of the collections that small teams are managing on a daily basis. These large collections show how much potential there is in existing museum collections, but they also highlight the challenges that come with many thousands of objects — attention cannot be given to all of them. We are here to give that attention to migration-related objects, and in doing so bring their valuable stories to a bigger national audience.
Migration Network Events
As well as looking at how to share stories and objects digitally, I have also been thinking through what the Migration Museum could physically collect in the next 3 to 5 years. The museum has always put its audiences first, creating exhibitions in collaboration with artists, story contributors, historians and local communities. How can we make the process of collecting objects as democratic as the guiding principles of the museum?
To help with this question, we have held two Migration Network events focused on museums and their collections. The first event in May was held online and 100 attendees heard presentations from North East Museums on their Multaka project, the Wiener Holocaust Library on their newly digitised collections, and Global Link on their Migration Stories North West project. The speakers gave brilliant insights into how the best digital engagement products and co-produced digital exhibitions out there today centre people’s interests in collections work.
Lucy and Daria introducing the Migration Museum at a Migration Network Event co-hosted with National Museums Liverpool. Image: Migration MuseumThe Migration Museum team at a Migration Network Event, co-hosted with National Museums Liverpool. Image: Migration Museum
At the beginning of September, we co-hosted an in-person Migration Network event with National Museums Liverpool (NML). Thanks to the generosity of NML staff, everyone was given insights into the latest plans for the Waterfront Transformation, and partnership work at the Maritime Museum, International Slavery Museum, World Museum and Museum of Liverpool. As well as discussing the role of objects, there was also an emphasis on the need to create spaces where people feel welcome, and how the co-design of spaces can link historic stories to contemporary cultures. So far it has been a year of many rich conversations and discoveries. We’ll be sharing the results of all of this project work early in 2026. In the meantime, we’d love to hear from you — what would you like to see at the Migration Museum?
Thanks to The National Lottery Heritage Fund and National Lottery players for supporting this project.
Over the past 13 years, we’ve welcomed more than 30,000 students, with around a third from secondary schools. Our cross-curricular learning programme has made a significant impact, linking personal experiences of migration to the broader landscape of migration in the UK.
Recently, however, demand from geography teachers has grown for workshops that focus specifically on migration from a geographical perspective.
While our award-winning learning team already has a proven track record of engaging students across different themes and subjects through our cross-curricular approach, this new demand presents an exciting opportunity. That’s why we’re expanding our geography offer — developing tailored workshops and resources that bring the human side of migration to the forefront of geography learning.
“What is often missing in schools from the way geography is taught is the human side of migration. This is where the Migration Museum’s approach of personal stories can really add to the statistics and facts that geography leads with in schools. We humanise, bring empathy and contextualise migration, in a way that is often difficult to do in the classroom.” — Tia Shah, Learning Manager at Migration Museum
Tia Shah, Learning Manager, and Liberty Melly, Head of Learning, speaking at the Geographical Association Conference 2025, Photo: Migration Museum
To meet this demand, we’ve been actively building partnerships, creating gallery resources, and developing new workshops. Some of the steps we’ve taken so far include:
Developed a new workshop menu tailored to specific subjects — starting with a KS3 geography workshop and a KS4 interactive talk
Included more geography specific resources on our resource bank. (Just type “geography” in the search bar to find them.)
Spoke at the Geographical Association Conference, delivering both primary and secondary sessions
Delivered a CPD session as part of GeogLive! Watch the recording here
Developed more specific CPD and ITT for geography teachers
These initiatives are just the start. As we continue to develop our learning programme, we aim to provide teachers with a growing menu of engaging, discursive workshops across subjects, supporting teachers and learners by bringing migration to every classroom — all as we work towards the opening of our permanent museum in 2028.
Central to all of these workshops is our approach to teaching migration: humanising the topic and leading with personal stories and connections to migration. By bringing our unique learning pedagogy and tried-and-tested tools to different subjects like geography, we ensure that migration is taught in a sensitive, empathetic, and personal way, supporting students to explore migration as a source of connection rather than division.
“The case studies…It really brought the examples to life hearing from, not about, the migrants.” — Harris Federation teacher
“It will give me more confidence to try and draw connections more frequently in our learning, and also to aim to humanise stories where possible.” — Queen Elizabeth’s School teacher
We’re excited to continue developing workshops that bring the human stories of migration into geography classrooms, helping students engage with the topic in meaningful, empathetic ways.
Interested? Book a workshop or talk with Tia, our Learning Manager, by emailing tia@migrationmuseum.org
Top Image: Student engaging with migration story discs at the Migration Museum, Photo: Migration Museum
Our front of house team’s warmth, care and curiosity made the Migration Museum in Lewisham a place where people came back to again and again — sometimes just for a chat or a quiet moment on the community sofas, at other times to spend an hour or more exploring our exhibitions.
Whether supporting emotional conversations, offering sensory tools for neurodivergent visitors, or simply greeting everyone who walks through our doors with a smile, our team makes the Migration Museum a space where everyone can feel they belong.
Family pictured at the Migration Museum in 2024 (Photo: Elzbieta Piekacz)
This national award celebrates the very best in visitor experience, and we are honoured to be recognised for creating one of the most welcoming, inclusive, and engaging museum environments in the UK.
From teens dropping in after school, to community elders, long-time supporters, parents with toddlers, first-time museum-goers, and even those who may be unsure about their links to migration, we aim to make everyone who visits the Migration Museum feel welcome. That belief is at the heart of everything we do — and it’s wonderful to have it acknowledged on this scale.
A Front of House Welcome at the Migration Museum (Photo: Elzbieta Piekacz)
We were shortlisted in a prestigious field alongside Derby Museums Trust Visitor Experience Team | Museum of Making, Nothe Fort operated by Weymouth Civic Society Wanting to make a difference: Visitor Experience at Nothe Fort, Chatham Historic Dockyard Trust The Historic Dockyard Chatham and Young V&A Young V&A Front of House Team. Congratulations to all of our colleagues who were shortlisted in this category.
The award, decided by a panel of independent judges with extensive experience across the museums and heritage sector, was announced at a glittering ceremony at the Hilton Park Lane, London, known as the ‘Oscars of the Museum World’, on Thursday 15 May.
Frances Ewings and Amanda Swift receiving the Visitor Welcome Award at the Museums + Heritage Awards 2025 (Photo: Hayley Bray)
Frances Ewings, Front of House Gallery Supervisor, said: “Thank you to the judges and a huge thank you to our Migration Museum visitors that support us, whether you’ve visited us once or are our regular faces. We’re thrilled to have our front of house work recognised through this award”
“At the Migration Museum, we pride ourselves on being welcoming to everyone – and as we have until recently been located in a shopping centre in Lewisham, south-east London, this really does mean everyone! From curious shoppers to those who have travelled across the country to see our exhibitions, we strive to ensure our work is accessible to all.”
“As we look ahead to our move to a permanent home in the City of London, opening in 2028, we plan to take what we’ve built in Lewisham with us and show that welcoming and supporting visitors is a crucial part of their experience and what people take away from the museum.”
“We hope to be an example of how the Front of House work is as vital as exhibitions, learning and programming in order for visitors to truly experience a museum’s values.”
To all of you who have visited, shared your story, brought friends or family, left kind comments in our welcome book, or recommended us to a friend — thank you. This award is for you, too.
Volunteer Amanda Swift leading a Stories in Focus mini-tour (Photo: Elzbieta Piekacz)
The Migration Museum is delighted to announce that the Portal Trust has become an inaugural donor of its new permanent home in the City of London.
The Portal Trust will provide £500,000 in funding over the next three years to help the Migration Museum establish Britain’s first permanent museum dedicated to exploring how migration has shaped who we are – as individuals, communities and nations.
The funding will support the salaries, capital and project costs of delivering the Migration Museum’s award-winning learning programme in its new permanent home from a dedicated learning suite to be used for educational activities including interactive workshops, creative activities, and meaningful discussions. The Migration Museum will name one of the the classrooms within the learning suite ‘The Portal Trust Education Room’ for a period of 20 years.
This funding will be instrumental in ensuring that more schools and families can visit the museum and benefit from our immersive, hands-on, story-led learning experiences.
The Portal Trust is an educational grant-making charity that enables young people in London, particularly those from disadvantaged or low-income backgrounds, to access educational opportunities. It has been supporting school groups to visit the Migration Museum since 2023 through funding for its Transforming Migration Education Programme, which works with teachers and students at Key Stage 3 and GCSE level.
The Portal Trust is based across the road from the site of the Migration Museum’s new permanent home, at the intersection of the City and the East End, areas with rich, multi-layered migration histories stretching back many centuries, and just minutes away from well-known landmarks including the Tower of London, Tower Bridge and the Bank of England.
When it reopens at its permanent home in 2028, the Migration Museum will be the UK’s first permanent museum dedicated to migration, welcoming 140,000 visitors a year to its exhibitions, events, learning and community programmes, including 20,000 learners.
Announcing the agreement, Richard Foley, Chief Executive of the Portal Trust, said:
“We’re excited to be on this journey with the Migration Museum until its opening in 2028 and beyond. Our support for the Migration Museum will place the study of migration where it belongs – at the heart of Britain’s history. It will also improve accessibility, ensuring more schools and families can visit the museum and benefit from the immersive, hands-on learning experiences that make visiting a museum so special.
“We’re especially excited to support the Portal Trust Education Room within the museum. By engaging with real-life migration stories, students will deepen their understanding of the world around them. The Education Room will be a powerful tool for educators, and a resource that brings these important conversations to life.
In today’s world, where discussions about migration can be divisive, the museum offers a much-needed space for reflection and understanding. It’s a place where young people can engage with complex issues in a safe and supportive environment, equipping them with the tools to become more inclusive and thoughtful citizens. The museum is not just about learning the past, it’s about shaping the future.”
Sophie Henderson, CEO of the Migration Museum, said:
“We are delighted to welcome the Portal Trust as an inaugural donor of our permanent home. Their support will be instrumental in growing our award-winning learning programme, which equips learners with the skills and confidence to better understand and contextualise who they are and how they fit into and are a part of Britain’s long history of migration.
The Portal Trust’s generous support will enable us to engage tens of thousands of young people a year on migration and intersecting themes from our dedicated education suite at our new permanent home in the City of London.
Now more than ever, we need an inspiring space for learners from across London, Britain and beyond to come together to explore, discuss and reflect on key questions around migration, identity and belonging – and the Portal Trust’s support will enable us to deliver this.”
This short video brings to life the Migration Museum’s award-winning learning programme and its impact on learners and teachers.
