object research

Once again flicking through the trade journals in our collection and recognising an object that we own has enriched our record with a wealth of information. This time I was looking through an edition of British Plastics from February 1955 and I stumbled across a fabulous article about the...

There is no better feeling than finding an important nugget of evidence about an object, even if it proves we have got something wrong. Ekco U122 radio, 1950. https://www.modip.ac.uk/artefact/aibdc-002557 Due to its age and colouring we had assumed, incorrectly, that the above EKCO U122 radio was...

A few weeks ago, we delivered an outreach engagement session to a local school, showing Year 7 pupils a selection of plastics objects related to WWII (refer image below). A selection of the WWII related objects. Image credit: Katherine Pell One of the objects that really caught my attention was the...

I know that I have written about my own fascination with trawling though old industry publications in previous blogs but, once again, the effort of doing so has been very rewarding. Actually, if I am being honest, on this occasion it was a colleague who was doing the trawling, but knowing that I had...

Last week I finally completed the catalogue records for a number of OXO kitchen utensils that MoDiP received as part of a generous donation back in November 2021. A total of 163 objects made their way into the museum’s collection, and I have already written a couple of blogs about some of the other...

Following on from my blog post about the Input range, designed by Conran Associates, manufactured by Crayonne Ltd (a subsidiary of Airfix Plastics set up in 1972) and sold through Habitat stores, this week’s post introduces some additional pieces from the series: the LP record and cassette racks...

A recent workshop provided the opportunity to look a little closer at a number of synthetic garments in MoDiP’s collections, and this blouse (refer image below) particularly caught my attention. AIBDC : 000824 Image credit: MoDiP It is very popular and gets used for research by students and teaching...

As term begins and the Arts University Bournemouth continues to welcome back students, we are beginning to return to some kind of normality. Over the past couple of weeks, we have been having zoom conversations with courses, introducing and reintroducing them to the museum and how they can use the...

An intriguing object found in amongst some recent donations to the MoDiP collection turned out to be something rather special. This shiny black piece of hard plastic came with a small handwritten note explaining that: ‘This phenolic rod was given to me by H.V. Potter, Chairman of Bakelite Ltd. He...

I have just catalogued this K-Tel Burger Matic, which was kindly donated to MoDiP by a friend of mine. Image ref: AIBDC : 008700 Image credit: Katherine Pell It works by making up to 8 burgers quickly and easily: a reusable polyethylene (HDPE) plastic disc is placed in the acrylic (PMMA) tube...

Florence Compound was the invention of Alfred Critchlow (1813-1881) who was a manufacturer of horn buttons in Birmingham, England. After emigrating to the US, where he initially continued in this trade, Critchlow eventually moved to Florence, Massachusetts, where, in the 1850s, he began to...

Following on from my recent blog post about Arne Jacobsen’s alarm clock, this week I am focusing on another object from MoDiP’s collections designed by him: the Cylinda-Line coffee pot from Danish tableware manufacturer Stelton. This sleek, stainless-steel range has contrasting, decorative phenol...