THE stories of our city could be told through its residents as the Museum of Oxford looks to transform into the “people’s museum”.

Those behind the museum, based in the Town Hall, have secured a grant of more than £140,000 to submit a bid for £1.6m to almost treble the exhibition space.

The new, expanded Museum of Oxford would encourage stories and artefacts to come from the community for exhibitions that tell the hidden histories of the city.

Oxford City Council is preparing a detailed development plan following the money from the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF).

Peter McQuitty, head of culture, said: “It really is the people’s museum which not only tells the story of Oxford and its communities, but one that is told by people in the city.

“We’re not going to be just bringing in exhibitions for people, we want the community to be involved in creating these exhibitions.

“For someone that has been involved in this process for so long, it really is exciting to see this first milestone ticked off.”

Local historian Liz Woolley, who was responsible for the hugely-successful 66 Men of Grandpont exhibition, charting the lives of the men in the area who fought in the First World War, welcomed the news.

She said: “I think it is really important and valuable to put on exhibitions that people own.

“It is important for people to be involved in creating these exhibitions and then of course come and see it with their families. It is a much better way of doing an exhibition, rather than a small group presenting something to the public.

“Local people getting involved in what is being put on is a really good idea and is a real community effort.”

Included in the project, which will cost £2.2m in total, are plans to revamp the Old Museum space, which closed in 2011, to increase the number of exhibits from 286 to 750.

There will be five community hubs in the main galleries, which will hold rolling exhibitions created by the public.

Mr McQuitty added: “We named the project Hidden Histories to find these nuggets of history and stories the public has. Very few people know about Oxford’s involvement in the English Civil War and Spanish Civil War, there is so much to uncover in this historical city.”

City council leader Bob Price hopes the museum, in the grade II* listed Town Hall, will become a world-class centre.

He said: “We want this to become a world-class museum for a world-class city.

“We have all these wonderful museums like Pitt Rivers, the Ashmolean, but none of them tell the story of the city and its people. We really do feel there is a real interest and capacity here to show something quite exceptional. We want to make Oxford history live on.”

More than 75,000 people visit the current museum every year, and it engages more than 100 people as volunteers.

The city council will submit its detailed proposal to the Heritage Lottery Fund in 2017.

If successful in its bid, building work would start in 2018 and the new museum would be open by 2020.

HOW IT LOOKS TODAY

NESTLED at the back of the Town Hall, the current Museum of Oxford has occupied two rooms since the 1970s.

The land on which the current Town Hall and Museum of Oxford sits, was the location of Oxford’s Medieval Jewish quarter.

In 1891, an architectural design competition was held for a new building on the same site.

Local Henry Hare won with a Jacobethan design and in 1897 the current building was completed.

The museum was established in 1975 as part of Oxfordshire County Council Museum Service.

The management of the museum service was taken over by Oxford City Council in 1999.

In 2009 it was decided to join the museum and Town Hall to bring together civic and cultural functions. 

But since its inception, there has been no investment in its concept or collection since the mid 1970s.

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EXPANSION PLANS

TO ACCOMMODATE the community’s hidden histories, the new Museum of Oxford will reclaim the Old Museum space, which was closed in 2011.

Included in the new area will be exhibition pods that sit in the main galleries.
The five pods will contain a rolling programme of community generated exhibitions.

To facilitate a “hands-on” experience, in the basement of the building a ‘Museum Makers’ space will be built.

The area will be accessible out of hours for community groups, and will be a place for staff and volunteers to work on the archive and museum collections.

Next door, a new learning room will be built to accommodate a new learning space for school parties, putting them at the centre of the collections. 

The museum also hopes to double the number of its volunteers from 100 to 200.

POTENTIAL NEW ATTRACTIONS

WITH new spaces come new exhibits, and visitors of the museum could expect to see:

* The Town Charter – The charter is currently in the basement of the old museum. It will be displayed and reinterred in one of the new museum spaces.

* F Cape & Co Counter – The counter is from a department store that was founded in 1877 by Faithful Cape. 
In 1893 the store at St Ebbe’s was bought by Henry Lewis and remained in that family’s ownership until it was pulled down in 1971.

* Cutteslowe Wall – The museum has part of the Cutteslowe Wall, which was built in 1934 to divide the city council’s Cutteslowe estate from private housing to the west.
In March 1959 the wall was torn down. The museum has one of the original bricks topped with the spikes. 

* Roman Kiln found in the 1970s

* Marmalade tin taken by Robert Falcon Scott on the National Antarctic Expedition of 1901-1904.

* With the £2.2m revamp the council hopes the number of exhibits will increase from 286 to 750.