The document summarizes information about the Young V&A museum in London. It was established in 1872 and focuses on exhibitions and programs for children, young people, and families. It underwent a redevelopment completed in 2023 to include new galleries on play, imagination, and design, as well as learning studios. The museum's goals are to inspire, empower, connect, and influence children and young people. It engaged in extensive co-design with local students and teachers to create experiences that reflect the community.

1. Finding Your Way co-design workshop, 30 April 2019, © Victoria
and Albert Museum, London
Young V&A
Making the ‘most joyful museum in the world’
Will Newton, Curator, Young V&A

2. Who am I?
• Will Newton, Curator at Young V&A
• Joined V&A Museum in 2011
• Furniture, Textiles and Fashion Department,
2011-2016
• V&A Museum of Childhood, 2016-2022
• Young V&A, 2022-
Judging a spacecraft design competition at Malmesbury Primary
School, Tower Hamlets during National Play Week, 2022

3. What’s Young V&A?

4. What’s Young V&A?
• Established in 1872
• East London’s first museum
• Reused parts of original V&A buildings
• Animal and food products, and local trades
• Hosted loaned collections of fine and
decorative art, such as Pitt-Rivers collection,
Wallace Collection, and National Portrait
Gallery

5. What’s Young V&A?
‘When the idea of first establishing the museum at Bethnal Green
was made known, it was stated that the valuables would be
greatly damaged by the rough people who inhabit that part of the
metropolis. The greatest local authority cautioned me, but I
trusted the poor people, and I am glad to say that there has not
been any damage done: on the contrary, that the people have
shown great appreciation of the institution, and respect for it.’
Sir Henry Cole, first Director of the V&A, 1852-1874

6. What’s Young V&A?
‘Children used to come here and wander round unseeing,
bored and sometimes noisy’
Arthur Sabin, Curator of Bethnal Green Museum, 1922-1940

7. What’s Young V&A?
• Focus on children began in the 1920s
• Revolutionised by Arthur Sabin, curator
1922-1940
• Officially designated the Museum of
Childhood in 1974
• UK national collection of childhood objects

8. What’s Young V&A?
‘The most joyful museum in the world’
The challenge given to us by our Children’s Forum, 2019

9. Young V&A
• Redeveloped as part of V&A FuturePlan programme
(2017-2023)
• A part of the V&A family of museums, designed for
children, young people and families
• Three permanent 650m² galleries: Play, Imagine and
Design
• 500m² temporary exhibition gallery
• New learning studios and staff facilities
• Improvements to public facilities, building access and
environment

10. The V&A Family
• V&A South Kensington (1852)
• Young V&A (1872)
• V&A Dundee (2018)
• V&A Wedgwood (2019)
• V&A East Museum (2025)
• V&A Storehouse (2025)

11. Why Young V&A?
Inspire Empower Connect Influence
Four aims to develop the creative confidence and design skills vital for Gen A to thrive
children and young
people's creative
agency and
voice through
engagement with the
V&A collections and
themes relating to art,
performance and
design.
educators to drive
forward creative
education in art,
performance and
design from early
years to secondary
school.
children and young
people with the
ingenuity of designers,
entrepreneurs,
innovators and
inventors and with
each other.
the sector in
building creative
confidence
through inclusive
museum practice for
children and young
people.

12. Local context
• London Borough of Tower Hamlets has
highest rates of child poverty in the UK
• Rapidly changing neighbourhood
• 43% LBTH residents born outside of UK
• 4th most linguistically diverse borough
in England and Wales – more than 90
different languages spoken
• Loyal local family audience

13. Our audience
• Children 0-14 and their families
• Each gallery has a different segment as its
primary audience
o Play = 0-5
o Imagine = 5-11
o Design = 11-14
• Extensive periods of co-design with members of
our audiences, working with the architects and
the curators

14. • Primary and secondary school children, families
and teachers
• How to get around the building
• Content themes for galleries
• The ‘look and feel’ of the spaces
• Specific co-produced and co-curated projects

15. Co-designing the experience with
Morpeth School
Co-designing the museum’s font with
Globe Primary School

16. Co-designing gallery spaces AOC working with teachers

17. Co-design sessions with De Matos Ryan, November 2019 and March 2020; the finished staircase, June 2023

18. Co-produced gallery projects
• Play Hacks • Young Perspectives on
Community
• This is Me photography project
• Under a Fiver
• Design and Me

19. Aimed at 0–5-year-olds, stretching to 12+ in The
Arcade
• Mini Museum – targeted at children under 3
years old
• Sound it Out – word play
• Moving and Making – fine and gross motor skills
• Build It – creative construction
• The Arcade – games
• Play Heroes – Pestalozzi, Fröbel, Montessori

26. Aimed at 5-11-year-olds
• Small Worlds – toys as tools for imagination
• Adventure – making stories using objects
• The Stage – self-expression through
performance
• Living Together – how communities can thrive
• The Living Room – form and function
• This is Me – children’s creative self-expression

31. Émilie Queney –
Young Perspectives
on Community

34. Rehan Jamil / Oxford House / Mile End Community
Project / Young V&A collaboration

35. • Aimed at 11–14-year-olds
• Design for Change – case studies exploring how
design can solve problems
• The Factory – how things are made
• Design and Me – how design has changed
people’s lives
• The Shed – studio space for artists in residence
• Open Studio – a space for visitors to creatively
respond to design problems

37. Design case studies - example

38. The Factory

42. Designer in residence Clara Chu running a
session with the public

43. New acquisitions
ZoLO, Sandra Higashi and Byron Glaser, 1986
© Victoria and Albert Museum, London

44. • 2,000 objects on display
• Utilises all V&A collections
• About 200 new acquisitions made for
the project
• New collecting policy
(Clockwise from top) Ancient Egyptian toilet tray; Michelangelo’s
Hand; Rain by David Hockney; Ad Hoc chair

45. Arranged! board game by Nashra Balagamwala
Using play to
explore a
serious topic –
arranged
marriages in
South Asia
© Victoria and Albert Museum, London

46. Imaginary Language construction toy by Alessandra
Romario
Prototype for
making props to
be used in
imaginary play,
based in
theories of
shape and
object
recognition.
© Victoria and Albert Museum,
London

47. Hero Arm prosthetic limb by Open Bionics
Multi-grip
prosthesis co-
designed with
its users,
predominantly
children and
young people.
© Victoria and Albert Museum,
London

48. Forum-Hi Humanchives sneakers by Kerwin Frost for
adidas
Trainers
designed by NY-
based fashion
influencer,
inspired by the
imagery of
childhood.
© Victoria and Albert Museum,
London

49. Thank you
Email: w.newton@vam.ac.uk