You can find full details of all our forthcoming events and activities in our What’s On and MERL Families guides, which are now available from the Museum or to download from our website You can also see all events on our online calendar

MERL Seminar series: Untouchable England
Basketry skills as intangible cultural heritage
Greta Bertram, Project Officer, Museum of English Rural Life
Tuesday 4th February, 1pm
Craft skills are recognised by UNESCO as intangible cultural heritage. Using the example of basketry, Greta will examine the idea of heritage craft, explore values that basketmakers ascribe to their work, and look to the future of intangible craft skills. Followed by a ‘pop-up’ display of baskets from the MERL collections in the object store,a nd a chance to talk about MERL’s current ‘Stakeholders’ project.

For full details of the series, visit our website

Italy at war: a selection from the archives
Tuesday 4th February to 30th March
NB Due to staff sickness, the opening of this exhibition has now been postponed until Tues 11th February. We apologise for any inconvenience caused.
Staircase hall, MERL
Free, drop-in, normal museum opening times
Highlights from the University’s fascinating records relating to Italian history. 

Black/White
Tuesday 4th to 7th February
Free, drop-in, normal museum opening times
An artistic intervention in the Museum galleries by University of Reading art students.

Guided tour
Wednesdays, Saturdays and Sundays, 3-3.45pm
Free, booking advisable
Let our fully trained tour guides tell you the stories behind the objects on display and visit the object store to see MERL’s hidden treasures.

Toddler time
Friday 7th February, 10-11am,
£2 per child, drop-in
Suitable for families with children aged 2-4
Come along to the Museum with your little ones and enjoy rhymes, songs and craft activities.  This week we’re making paper plate owls!

Collecting the countryside: 20th century rural cultures
Until Autumn 2014
Temporary exhibition space
Free, drop in, normal museum opening times
Since 2008 the Museum of English Rural Life has been adding even more objects to its collection, with support from the Heritage Lottery Fund’s Collecting Cultures programme, in order to represent each decade of the last century. (Find out more in Curator, Isabel Hughes’ recent post) This exhibition gives a taste of what has been acquired and challenges visitors to suggest the modern-day objects that the Museum needs to collect for the future. The exhibition will help the Museum to explore how to incorporate more recent histories and representations of the English countryside into its displays as part of the new Our Country Lives project.