February's Hipster Museum: The Steam Museum

Earlier this month we featured Kew Bridge's Steam Museum as one of our top heritage wedding venues. We have a little suspicion that a few of you may have thought - wait what? Where is that? An industrial museum in London? Is Kew Bridge in London? These are exactly the sort of questions we hope to answer in our #hipstermuseum series, so with that in mind, we made the trek to become one with the power of steam.

If you want to get to the Steam Museum, then you'll need to board a train at Waterloo at take it all the way (shock horror) to Zone 3. Yes thats right, further out than your zone 1-2 travel card- but hey, if you want to see three story tall steam engines in situ, then you need to travel a bit. (Yes we know you can see a steam engine at the Science Museum, but its not sitting in its original, purpose built building IS IT?!) Once you get off the train you shouldn't have too much difficulty locating the museum as its enormous 200 foot high Italianate standpipe tower literally towers over the local area. While it might look like it, this isn't actually a chimney, but a clever series of inter-connected pipes which helped maintain the pressure between the water mains and the fu**king enormous steam engines inside the waterworks.

The Kew Bridge Pumping Station (aka the buildings and machinery which now comprise the museum) was founded in 1838 to help improve the drinking water for early nineteenth century London. As you probably know from your medical history, the first half of the 1800s was not a super great time to be alive in the city- what with all the cholera and that. It was discovered however that the water to the West of the city was less polluted, and therefore the station was constructed by the Grand Junction Waterworks Company. The buildings were made around the enormous steam engines needed to pump water to residents, and many of them are still in place today, now supplemented by further acquisitions to the historic collections. 

Despite expanding and making an enormous amount of money, it turns out private companies like the Grand Junction Waterworks weren't necessarily providing London with the clean water it needed. The government stepped in and created the Metropolitan Water Board in 1904. Not overly impressed with the Victorian facilities at Kew, the MWB chose not to modernise, leaving the steam engines running until the 1940s. After its closure in the mid-twentieth century, Kew Bridge pumping station was immediately designated as a museum - although one that wasn't really open to the public or advertised. You simply had to be in the know to get in. #1950shipsters 

Since its 2014 refurbishment, the newly rebranded Steam Museum is trying to make its name as a cool, interactive place to learn about the history of sanitation and water engineering in London. But its also a totally awesome and aesthetic venue perfect for events, filming, and badass industrial selfies, as well as a popular place for school tours and, as ever, engineering geekery. 

It might be a bit of a trek, but the Steam Museum is such an amazing atmospheric site its already been in some of your favourite TV shows including Dr Who and East Enders. With a swish new cafe, brand new interpretation, and an ever increasing events programme, it's definitely worth the trip west! 

Chanelling our inner steam-punk at Victoriana: The Art of Revival

Here at the Ministry we tend not to write reviews of the events we attend. Why? It seems cruel- because you have already missed out on your chance to be there. But in this case you will just have to suffer through your jealousy, because we are dying to tell you all about the Guildhall Art Gallery’s Neo-Victorian Ball in honour of its current exhibition, Victoriana: The Art of Revival.

The ladies swoon for the Lion of London- or was it because of the corsets?

It was a mild October evening when the Guildhall, that majestic symbol of the City of London’s government since the 15^th century, was descended upon by a motley crew in Victorian garb. The Guildhall’s medieval crypts seemed perfectly suited to the corseted and top-hatted audience. We watched the Lion of London perform feats of amazing strength and gentlemanly courage. The Dead Victorians performed rousing music-hall numbers while live drawing took place by candlelight. I cannot image how many bottles of prosecco and rosewater cocktails were consumed in the evening, but based on my own experience, I think we can safely assume a lot.

Wait, what year is this?!

The atmosphere of frivolity perfectly enhanced the purpose of the evening’s events: to promote the Victoriana exhibition. The displays are centred around four themes which embody some of the things we find so fascinating about the Victorians today: neo-Victorian Identity (like corsets, lace and tattoos), time travel (and the steam-punk movement), cute and curious (the macabre element) and the re-imagined parlour (the home and decorative objects). You are welcomed into the exhibition by a marble bust of the great General Gordon, only adorned with the requisitely complex steam-punk goggles. Next up you’ll find a Victorian taxidermy scene in its wood box, only this display contains a hidden camera to another area of the gallery rather than a taxidermy centre piece. Down the stairs you sweep past a marble statue surrounded by ‘fairies’ or rather bees which swing unnervingly around the artwork.

The exhibition does a fantastic job of incorporating the wide variety of media to explore the ways in which the Victorian era continued to captivate artists today. Sculpture and photography are particularly prevalent, but I particularly enjoyed the incorporation of ink on paper graphics as well as fashion. The art also seemed to incorporate a very lively sense of humour: something you may not necessarily have expected from an exhibition about the Victorians. Despite their staid social morals, artists looking back on this era seem to feel confident being self-referential, transgressive, sexual and even downright funny. Extra points if you can spot the William Morris joke in cartoon, saving the day with perfect symmetry.

It’s of course also worth remembering that the Victorians were not so different to ourselves. We might remember a Queen all in black and a grand vision of empire: but the Victorians were also known for their raunchy songs, music-hall debauchery, business acumen and amazing ability to push beyond the bounds of possibility. It has been widely noted that we are now the New Victorians, and the Art of Revival exhibition serves to highlight all the ways we continue to be fascinated and inspired by the Victorians before us. Also, that adults really really like playing dress-up. 

 Maybe it’s my own inner steam-punk personality, but I can safely say that Victoriana is one of my favourite art exhibitions this year. You may not get to swoon over Leopold or dance the waltz in the crypts, but there’s nothing to stop you from getting your corset and goggles on and heading down to the Guildhall!

As if we needed an excuse to dress up. 

Victoriana: The Art of Revival is on at the Guildhall Art Gallery through the 8^th of December. Also don’t miss out on upcoming events like the Victoriana Film Series at Birkbeck or the Victorian Christmas family event on the 1^st of December.