In brief

Mansfield Museum in Nottinghamshire has won the 2011 Guardian Family Friendly Museum Award. The shortlist included the Abbey House Museum, Leeds; Corinium Museum, Cirencester; the Horniman, London; Kilmartin House Museum, Argyll; and the Potteries Museum and Art Gallery, Stoke-on-Trent. The fact that local choirs use the Mansfield museum as a venue counted in its favour.


The Scottish government has awarded £2m in extra funding to Portrait of the Nation, the £17.6m project to renovate the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, which is set to reopen in November. Pictured is Alex Nasmyth’s portrait of Robert Burns (1787).


The Museums Association has awarded £69,000 worth of grants to seven projects in the final round of its Effective Collections scheme. Successful applicants, including Derby Museum Services and Orkney Arts Museum, will use the grants to review and develop their stored collections. Further funding for collections work is available through the Esmée Fairbairn Collections Fund.


CyMAL: Museums Archives and Libraries Wales has announced that museums in Wales will receive more than £460,000 as part of a £2.8m 2011-12 funding package for museums, libraries and archives. Grants totalling £346,515 have been allocated to 28 museum-related projects. The remaining money will go towards delivering the Museum Strategy for Wales 2010-15.