Blog

Our current exhibition, Endurance , shows how good design and the right choice of plastics materials can play a part in reducing risk to life and help us to survive in a variety of situations. The exhibition is made up of 11 cases the first of which, in the air , features a single object. Gentex...

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...

Earlier in September we attended the Festival of Plastics, held at the Museum of London. This festival was a celebration of the C OMPLEX project which was coming to an end after five years. The project, run by UCL’s Institute for Sustainable Heritage, received funding from the European Research...

MoDiP recently visited the Yunex Traffic manufacturing facility in Poole to talk about traffic lights. The company supply, install and maintain traffic signal and control equipment for the BCP council, and had kindly offered to donate some plastics objects to the museum. We were treated to a tour of...

The enduring properties of plastics materials can have negative connotations, especially in relation to the pollution of land and oceans by poorly managed waste streams, single-use products, and those that are carelessly thrown away. Those same material characteristics can be put to good use to make...

MoDiP has three different examples of plastics NAAFI tokens in the collection. With reference to the image below, on the left is a circular ½ d token, in the centre an octagonal ½ franc token and on the right, a circular green coloured token valid in NAAFI Egypt only. MoDiP’s three NAAFI tokens...

Having just watched a documentary about the 1970s sitcom ‘The Good Life’ last night, I was inspired to write this blog about MoDiP’s lovely Frank Usher maxi dress (refer image below). I am sure it would have been the kind of thing that Margo would have worn, perhaps accessorised with a sparkling...

This beautiful GPO 312L telephone (refer image below) is currently on display in the museum for just a few weeks more, as part of our exhibition Why Plastics? I love it because it reminds me of my own 312, although mine is black in colour and made of bakelite (phenol formaldehyde). AIBDC : 008939...

I recently catalogued a View-master, Model F, stereo viewer (refer image below). It was designed by Charles ‘Chuck’ Harrison in 1958 whilst he was working for the US design company, Robert Podall Associates. It was manufactured by Sawyer’s and was their last model to be made in bakelite (phenol...

Currently on display in the museum as part of the Why Plastics? exhibition, is a range of tableware created by industrial designer and ergonomist, Russell Manoy, in 1969. It was intended for disabled users, with particular reference to those suffering from rheumatoid arthritis, but was also...