Newsletter: October 2024
Welcome to the latest edition of the Royal Mint Museum Newsletter. October was all about exhibitions and education for the team at the Royal Mint Museum. Find out more below.
Exhibition at the British Museum
Our Exhibitions Manager, Abigail Kenvyn, has recently created a new, temporary, display for the British Museum centred around the new coins of Charles III.
Inspired by the King’s love of the natural world, the four nations of the United Kingdom are represented through a variety of British flora and fauna and include a red squirrel, puffin and hazel dormouse.
The coins are eye-catchingly arranged in the shape of three interlocking Cs. It is a feature that appears on the reverse of each coin, inspired by the royal cypher of Charles II, on whose seventeenth-century coins a similar symbol appeared.
The display will remain in the Money Gallery until the new year.
Royal Mint Net Zero Festival
The Museum team were delighted to take part in the Royal Mint’s Net Zero Festival at the beginning of the month.
Our Education Manager, Amy Williams, and Museum Assistant, Megan James, discussed sustainable practises with external companies and Mint departments who are working to achieve net zero. Our stall highlighted our sustainability themed education sessions and resources, our upcoming short story competition and our Reminiscence Box project for care homes.
National Education Day
At the beginning of October the Education Manager and a Team member from the Royal Mint Experience attended the National Education Show in Cardiff. This is one of the leading education events in Wales, providing opportunities and new ways to improve and raise standards, enhance learning experiences and support learners.
It is also a great networking event for the Museum giving us platform to engage with teachers, school leaders, and other education organisation.
It was a fun day where we were able to engage other educators seeking collaboration opportunities, as well as promoting our education workshops, short story competition and online education resources.
Short story competition winner visit
The winner of our 2024 Coins and the Sea short story competition, Ione Knight, made a special VIP trip to the Royal Mint Experience this month to see the Coins and the Sea exhibition. Ione was accompanied by her family and had a wonderful time exploring the Royal Mint Experience and seeing another part of the project she was involved in.
Ione’s story, The Girl with the Hair Like Fire was illustrated by coin designer David Lawrence and won a voucher for £5,000 for her primary school library. You can read the wonderful story, as chosen by BBC Broadcaster and Public Historian Greg Jenner, here. Thank you, Ione, for being such a wonderful winner and bringing your family to meet us!