Weekly What's On: May 19th to 25th
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: The Great War & the countryside Food security in the Great War: the contribution of wartime […]
Press release: What's cooking in the community? Find out at the MERL Village Fete
Food Science students at the University of Reading have been challenged to create new dishes from ingredients used by the diverse communities in Reading. The results will be revealed in the ‘Reading, Steady, Cook!’ demonstrations at the MERL Village Fete on May 31st. The Village Fete at the Museum of English Rural Life, which is […]
Biscuit recipe of the week: Picnic Café's famous macaroons
by Alison Hilton, Marketing Officer and biscuit sampler. Fans of Picnic Café in Reading will share my excitement about this week’s recipe, which owner, Jon Amery has kindly agreed to share. Picnic is supplying the cake for the tea tent at the MERL Village Fete again this year, and Jon will be a judge on the […]
Rural Reads review #6: Harvest by Jim Crace
by Rob Davies, Volunteer Coordinator and Rural Reads regular. In April, members of Rural Reads read Harvest by Jim Crace – you can already guess the rural connection. Harvest was shortlisted for the Booker Prize 2013 and had rave reviews, the quotes on the back of the book give it high praise. “One of his […]
Please touch: Future handling collection at MERL
written by Adam Koszary, Project Officer. One of the biggest complaints levelled at museums is that visitors cannot touch anything. Objects are put tantalisingly out of reach behind thin Perspex and glass, or an arms-length behind a velvet rope. It is annoying because objects are almost always meant to be touched, and especially so in […]
Our Country Lives update: How we research
written by Adam Koszary, Project Officer. You may have noticed that we’ve been a bit quiet recently about our HLF-funded redevelopment project, Our Country Lives. This is because we’re waiting for a response from the Heritage Lottery Fund due on June 13th (fingers crossed), but also because a lot of us have been busy catching […]
Weekly What's On: 12th to 18th May
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 Pop-up lunchtime concert: Albert Ball’s Flying Aces Tuesday 13th May, 1.10-1.50pm Free. Drop-in Refreshments available. This term the University […]
Biscuit recipe of the week: Chocolate chip cookies
Another recipe to practise for the Biscuit Bake-off, written by Alison Hilton At the recent launch of the Biscuit Bake-off competition, Andrew Palmer’s wife, Davina, very kindly presented MERL staff with a signed copy of her book ‘Kitchen Diplomacy: 30 years of Foreign Service Cooking’. I was amazed to discover, on reading the introduction, that […]
Discovering the Landscape #5: Mawson’s ‘The art & craft of garden making’ (1900)
Written by Claire Wooldridge, Graduate Trainee Library Assistant As progress continues to integrate the library and archive of the Landscape Institute into our MERL collections, here’s a brief look at another of our favourite items: The art & craft of garden making by Thomas H. Mawson (London: B.T. Batsford, 1900) In his first book, Mawson […]
Volunteers Voice #11: Reviewing your volunteer programme
Written by Rob Davies, Volunteer Co-ordinator. As in all aspects of an organisation, it is always a useful exercise to review your volunteer programme. This isn’t a review of the volunteers themselves but an overall review of the entire programme. A review enables you to take a step back from your day to day work, […]