The creation of the Biggin Hill Memorial Museum in Kent is long overdue. There have been calls for more than 30 years to build a museum that honours the pilots who flew from RAF Biggin Hill and were killed during the second world war.
The then prime minister Winston Churchill once described the airfield as the “strongest link” in protecting the country during the Battle of Britain. He subsequently instructed the building of St George’s RAF Chapel of Remembrance, which is now the star of the show at the new museum that opened to the public at the beginning of February.
All the usual facilities are there, but with a few nice touches. For instance, the gender-neutral toilets are a positive step towards inclusivity, even if they are not necessarily there by design, but to maximise the limited space. The wifi is fast and reliable without visitors having to fill in lengthy forms on the landing page. The cafe offers a simple menu of hot and cold food for under a fiver and around half of the options are vegetarian.
And while you fill up on cake and soya cappuccinos there is plenty to discover about the history of the family who ran the cafe during the second world war. These are the kinds of details scattered throughout the building that show the museum has made people’s stories centre stage.
Personal connections
Every visitor is offered a tablet guide at the beginning of the exhibition, with options for adults, schools and families. Although volunteers take great care to explain how the tablets work, there are still some technical hiccups, with staff having to fix the issues. This doesn’t make for the smoothest gallery experience, but the content is incredibly rich and adds vibrant colour to the gallery interpretation.
An introduction from the broadcaster and historian Dan Snow adds clout to the interpretation, but does feel disjointed as he does not appear again. Hopefully, the audioguide will plug this hole, though it was not available when I visited. Nevertheless, the overall digital content has been executed to a high quality, in particular the video interviews with former RAF personnel, which are sensitive and thoughtful.
To complement the tablet guides, the museum has made a wise choice of non-digital interactives that appeal to adults and children. With the inevitable tech issues involved with the tablets, it is a relief to find familiar games and activities such as sending and receiving messages in morse code.
Inclusive displays
A conscious effort has also been made to include the stories of people of colour, women and children, which historically have been overlooked, or added as an afterthought, by many military museums. At Biggin Hill, you don’t just hear about the usual heroes and pilots – people from different walks of life are given equal wall space in the gallery, their objects are displayed just as proudly and their voices heard just as loud.
After exploring the new gallery space, visitors are supposed to be encouraged to enter St George’s Chapel. But the wayfinding ends abruptly as visitors meet bolted doors and no signage. This is a shame as the chapel is the highlight of the museum experience.
The chapel is still used for Anglican and Catholic services on Sundays, and boasts 12 beautiful stained-glass windows designed by Hugh Easton, the artist who created the Battle of Britain windows at Westminster Abbey, London. They have been painstakingly restored, as has the wooden floor made from propeller blade offcuts.
I cannot fault this museum for prioritising the experience of local visitors, but I do feel that the stories of international pilots’ contributions at Biggin Hill could have been teased out further. Some stories are mentioned in some of the text panels, but not expanded on in a meaningful way.
Biggin Hill Memorial Museum makes no grand claims to tackle the bigger contemporary questions about conflict, the role of the RAF or how these relate to our society now. Visitors are not challenged in this way or asked to think about wider issues.
But there is a quieter sense of dissent that is summed up in the interpretation of one of the final objects on display in the chapel. A large plaster bust of Churchill stands in the centre of one of the rooms and the label begins with a description of the artist and her family who lived near Biggin Hill. It goes on to describe the bust as a memorial to the “local family who used their artistry to create lasting war memorials across the world”. This label is a fitting tribute to the people behind the famous airfield and tells visitors which stories the museum values and honours.
Shaz Hussain is an assistant curator at the Science Museum
The initial impetus for the newly opened Biggin Hill Memorial Museum was to safeguard St George’s RAF Chapel of Remembrance after the Ministry of Defence announced its intention to withdraw funding in late 2014. What soon became apparent was the equally urgent need to gather and protect the intangible heritage of RAF Biggin Hill.
The significance of Biggin Hill’s aviation history as one of Britain’s oldest aerodromes is well known. The richness of its heritage, however, really lies in the century-long stories belonging to the service people who served there and those who lived in the surrounding communities.
Gathering and recording these personal experiences of war became the primary focus for the museum team. Through open days, outreach, adverts in the local press and social media appeals, the community of RAF Biggin Hill began to share experiences and objects with us. The building of trust and partnership was a key aspect of this process. Some of the people we first met in 2015 didn’t share their stories on camera until 2017.
A local wartime child, Jean Simpson, donated an entire archive chronicling her family’s experience of war having “heard about the project from a friend at church”. This collection is now displayed in a section dedicated to her family and includes a rare selection of prisoner of war postcards.
Today the museum’s collection of objects, photographs and personal testimony is a symbol of the best of human spirit and of the generosity of Biggin Hill’s community, past and present.
Jemma Davey is the director of Biggin Hill Memorial Museum
The then prime minister Winston Churchill once described the airfield as the “strongest link” in protecting the country during the Battle of Britain. He subsequently instructed the building of St George’s RAF Chapel of Remembrance, which is now the star of the show at the new museum that opened to the public at the beginning of February.
The £5.3m project to create the Biggin Hill Memorial Museum started under a cloud. When the building plans were announced, a petition was signed by more than 26,000 people in protest over the new building, fearing that it would ruin the integrity of the existing Grade II-listed chapel.
Building a memorial museum will always be a difficult task, but particularly so at Biggin Hill, where the collective memory of the airfield’s role during world war two is still present in the local community.
The design of the new building is contemporary. The minimal structure wraps itself like a wall around the chapel, symbolically protecting it. Despite the initial protests, it is clear that every effort has been made to keep the chapel and the stories of the Biggin Hill community at the heart of the museum.
According to the museum’s director, Jemma Davey, it aims to “remember the few and honour the many”. The main entrance is well signposted and is a hub of activity, with numerous volunteers and staff welcoming visitors.
All the usual facilities are there, but with a few nice touches. For instance, the gender-neutral toilets are a positive step towards inclusivity, even if they are not necessarily there by design, but to maximise the limited space. The wifi is fast and reliable without visitors having to fill in lengthy forms on the landing page. The cafe offers a simple menu of hot and cold food for under a fiver and around half of the options are vegetarian.
And while you fill up on cake and soya cappuccinos there is plenty to discover about the history of the family who ran the cafe during the second world war. These are the kinds of details scattered throughout the building that show the museum has made people’s stories centre stage.
Personal connections
Every visitor is offered a tablet guide at the beginning of the exhibition, with options for adults, schools and families. Although volunteers take great care to explain how the tablets work, there are still some technical hiccups, with staff having to fix the issues. This doesn’t make for the smoothest gallery experience, but the content is incredibly rich and adds vibrant colour to the gallery interpretation.
An introduction from the broadcaster and historian Dan Snow adds clout to the interpretation, but does feel disjointed as he does not appear again. Hopefully, the audioguide will plug this hole, though it was not available when I visited. Nevertheless, the overall digital content has been executed to a high quality, in particular the video interviews with former RAF personnel, which are sensitive and thoughtful.
To complement the tablet guides, the museum has made a wise choice of non-digital interactives that appeal to adults and children. With the inevitable tech issues involved with the tablets, it is a relief to find familiar games and activities such as sending and receiving messages in morse code.
The gallery space – and the tablet guide – are broken up into themes so visitors can peruse the objects, stories and film installation in any order. In the centre of the gallery, there is a seating area with a digital interactive timeline where many visitors choose to sit and explore the videos and archive material at greater length.
The space is well lit and has been expertly designed to encourage visitors to slow their pace. All the content is informed and led by the personal stories of the various people who lived and served at Biggin Hill.
Inclusive displays
A conscious effort has also been made to include the stories of people of colour, women and children, which historically have been overlooked, or added as an afterthought, by many military museums. At Biggin Hill, you don’t just hear about the usual heroes and pilots – people from different walks of life are given equal wall space in the gallery, their objects are displayed just as proudly and their voices heard just as loud.
After exploring the new gallery space, visitors are supposed to be encouraged to enter St George’s Chapel. But the wayfinding ends abruptly as visitors meet bolted doors and no signage. This is a shame as the chapel is the highlight of the museum experience.
The chapel is still used for Anglican and Catholic services on Sundays, and boasts 12 beautiful stained-glass windows designed by Hugh Easton, the artist who created the Battle of Britain windows at Westminster Abbey, London. They have been painstakingly restored, as has the wooden floor made from propeller blade offcuts.
I cannot fault this museum for prioritising the experience of local visitors, but I do feel that the stories of international pilots’ contributions at Biggin Hill could have been teased out further. Some stories are mentioned in some of the text panels, but not expanded on in a meaningful way.
Biggin Hill Memorial Museum makes no grand claims to tackle the bigger contemporary questions about conflict, the role of the RAF or how these relate to our society now. Visitors are not challenged in this way or asked to think about wider issues.
But there is a quieter sense of dissent that is summed up in the interpretation of one of the final objects on display in the chapel. A large plaster bust of Churchill stands in the centre of one of the rooms and the label begins with a description of the artist and her family who lived near Biggin Hill. It goes on to describe the bust as a memorial to the “local family who used their artistry to create lasting war memorials across the world”. This label is a fitting tribute to the people behind the famous airfield and tells visitors which stories the museum values and honours.
Shaz Hussain is an assistant curator at the Science Museum
Focus on Community stories
The initial impetus for the newly opened Biggin Hill Memorial Museum was to safeguard St George’s RAF Chapel of Remembrance after the Ministry of Defence announced its intention to withdraw funding in late 2014. What soon became apparent was the equally urgent need to gather and protect the intangible heritage of RAF Biggin Hill.
The significance of Biggin Hill’s aviation history as one of Britain’s oldest aerodromes is well known. The richness of its heritage, however, really lies in the century-long stories belonging to the service people who served there and those who lived in the surrounding communities.
Gathering and recording these personal experiences of war became the primary focus for the museum team. Through open days, outreach, adverts in the local press and social media appeals, the community of RAF Biggin Hill began to share experiences and objects with us. The building of trust and partnership was a key aspect of this process. Some of the people we first met in 2015 didn’t share their stories on camera until 2017.
A local wartime child, Jean Simpson, donated an entire archive chronicling her family’s experience of war having “heard about the project from a friend at church”. This collection is now displayed in a section dedicated to her family and includes a rare selection of prisoner of war postcards.
Today the museum’s collection of objects, photographs and personal testimony is a symbol of the best of human spirit and of the generosity of Biggin Hill’s community, past and present.
Jemma Davey is the director of Biggin Hill Memorial Museum
Project data
- Cost £5.3m
- Main funder National Lottery Heritage Fund
- Architect Robin Lee Architecture
- Construction Building Associates Limited
- Fitout Marcon
- Exhibition design Redman Design
- Lighting DHA Designs
- Display cases Click Netherfield
- Mounts Plowden and Smith
- AV ETT Solutions; Chocolate Films
- Tablets Surface Impression
- Interactives Sirius Model Makers
- Graphics Redman Design
- Cafe wall graphic Olivia Boutrou
- Admission Adult £8.50; child £4.50
