This past weekend marked the reopening of The People’s Story Museum after being closed for over two years. The People’s Story Museum delves into the lives of everyday people in Edinburgh. People from the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries are brought to life through re-created locations, displays, and costumed figures, from work to home, healthcare to social activities. Throughout the Museum, real people’s recollections are used.
Printing, brewing, and domestic service are among the occupations represented, across the 3 floors of one of the cities most visually appealing buildings. With exhibits on leisure and time out, they also take a lighter approach. From a bar sign to prisoner restraints and political reform banners, the Museum is jam-packed with authentic artefacts.
The museum has the largest collection of early reform flags and banners in the UK, with 144 in all. Banners in support of political reform, labour unions, and the anti-apartheid movement are among them. The museum also has waxworks that depict the written history of the people of Edinburgh.
Incredible history
Now being dubbed “Edinburgh’s Vintage Museum”, you’ll find much of the building and exhibits themselves largely unchanged since the opening of the museum in the 1950s making it a time capsule for how local museums were designed during those years.
The historical Canongate Tolbooth, a category ‘A’ listed building erected in 1591 on the site of an earlier tollbooth, houses The People’s Story. When the Burgh of Canongate was independent of Edinburgh, it served as the courthouse, prison, and administrative centre.
Review
For over two years, we have walked past this beautiful building hundreds of times and often wondered what its status is – was it closing down? Was it being refurbished? But we had to wait until last weekend in order to find out the answer. We were out for a walk in the old town and just happened to walk past the open door to the museum. We immediately entered where we were given a warm welcome by Stevie, a charismatic team member for the museum, who later walked with us to give more detail and background on some parts of the collection. Particular highlights of our wee tour:
- Learning about the layout from when the building was flats
- Trying to guess which celebrities the mannequins were originally made to represent, from before the museum acquired them (can you spot Sylvester Stallone?)
Price: Free!
This weekend also marked the reopening of The Writers Museum. More information on that museum here: edinburghmuseums.org.uk/venue/writers-museum
You can find out more about the People’s Story museum here: edinburghmuseums.org.uk/venue/peoples-story-museum