Exhibition specialists swoop on Scapa Flow Museum

The rebuild of Scapa Flow Museum’s exhibition kicked into high gear earlier this month when the multi-disciplinary team visited Orkney to collaborate on what will be a totally new look and feel to the visitor experience.

Seven specialist firms are involved in bringing a new redesigned exhibition to the Scapa Flow Museum, which tells the story of the UK’s most important naval anchorage in the First and Second World Wars. All were appointed following competitive tendering processes by Orkney Islands Council, which runs the Museum.

(Pictured here are specialist mountmakers Colin Lindley and Kate Silverston at work in Orkney Islands Council’s Museum’s stores, removing the Royal Oak letters from their previous mount in preparation for refreshed display when the Scapa Flow Museum reopens in summer 2022.)

Although a planned ‘in-person’ meet-up of all the firms involved was hampered by bad weather, some of them managed to sail to Lyness on other days to tour the site and start documenting details for their work ahead, while others collaborated online, with Jude Callister, the Museum’s Visitor Services Officer based in Lyness able to relay visuals as needed from the site.

The specialist visitors included:

• Studio MB, based in Edinburgh: award-winning exhibition designers, working closely with the Council’s Museums team since the project’s inception (Ally Hickson, Senior 3D Designer).
• Marcon, based in Belfast: exhibition outfitters and cabinet builders (Martin McErlean and Mathew Hendren).
• Rocketbox Design Ltd, based in Somerset: graphics and artwork designers for exhibition panels (Rob Loxston, Creative Director).
• Specialist scriptwriter Allan Carswell, based in Edinburgh: devising the flow of the story told by the Museum as a whole and within the individual galleries.
• Colin Lindley and Kate Silverston, based in London: Mountmakers designing and building custom-made supports to display and show artefacts at their best.

Also appointed and due to visit later are audiovisual specialists Ay-Pe, who are developing a series of short films on Scapa Flow for the Museum.

The Museum team has also been working with the University of St Andrews School of Computer Science on a Virtual Reality display – the first time VR has been developed for a museum in Orkney. It’s funded through CUPIDO, an international project which sees Highlands and Islands Enterprise, in partnership with the University of St Andrews, working with communities and social enterprises across the North of Scotland to help economic development within the culture sector.

Nick Hewitt, Team Leader for Culture at Orkney Islands Council, said: “These visits represent a real milestone in the Museum’s redevelopment. It marks the start of moving from a construction focus, to one that every Museum professional loves – that is, the work of building in the layers of detail which brings a collection alive and draws the stories of its artefacts to the fore.”

Craig Mann, Founding Partner, from Studio MB said: “We’ve been working with the Scapa Flow Museum redevelopment project since 2015, so it’s incredibly exciting to see the exhibition fit-out now preparing to commence on site with such a great set of contractors to help deliver the vision that we and the Council’s Museums team have worked so hard to create.”

Chair of the Council’s Education, Leisure and Housing Committee, Councillor Gwenda Shearer, said: “Scapa Flow Museum tells the story of Orkney as epicentre of the Royal Navy’s war efforts during the World Wars, and the massive impact this had on our remote island communities who suddenly found themselves a major part of the machinery of conflict. The improvements to the Museum and associated conservation works have been long awaited by our Museums team and by the local community - and by enthusiasts of wartime history around the world. We can’t wait to bring that story to life for many, many more people when the Museum reopens in summer 2022.”

Scapa Flow Museum is currently undergoing a refurbishment project valued at £4.4 million, comprising an extension to the Museum and refurbishment of its historic oilpumphouse. The project is supported by Orkney Islands Council, the National Lottery Heritage Fund, Historic Environment Scotland, the Orkney LEADER 2014-2020 programme, Highlands and Islands Enterprise, Museums Galleries Scotland and the Scottish Government’s European Regional Development Fund programme, managed by NatureScot through the Natural & Cultural Heritage Fund. (The Natural & Cultural Heritage Fund is part of the Scottish Government’s European Regional Development Fund programme, which finishes in 2023. NatureScot is also managing another element of the programme – the Green Infrastructure Fund. The Scottish Government is the Managing Authority for the European Regional Development Fund and the European Structural Funds 2014-20 Programme. For further information visit the Scottish Government website or follow @scotgovESIF.)

The Museum charts Orkney’s military involvement in the First and Second World Wars and provides a safe home for a major collection of wartime artefacts, many of national and international importance. Sited at the former Lyness Royal Naval Base HMS Proserpine, on the island of Hoy, the Museum tells the story of Scapa Flow as the UK’s most important naval anchorage during both world wars.

When complete, the Museum will open all year round for the first time in many years, encouraging more people to visit Hoy and boosting tourism throughout the island and Orkney.

The Museum is expected to open in summer 2022.

These nameplate letters were illegally removed from the wreck of HMS Royal Oak in the early 1970s by an amateur diver on holiday in Orkney. The diver later emigrated to Canada, taking the letters with him.

In 1994 the letters were handed over to the Royal Navy in Canada and then returned to Great Britain. After restoring and mounting the letters, the Royal Navy presented them to Orkney Islands Council in October 1995. They have since been on display at the Scapa Flow Museum as a memorial to those who lost their lives in the sinking.

HMS Royal Oak was one of five Revenge-class battleships built for the Royal Navy during the First World War. Completed in 1916, the ship first saw combat at the Battle of Jutland as part of the Grand Fleet.

On 14 October 1939, Royal Oak was anchored in Scapa Flow when she was torpedoed by the German submarine U-47. Of Royal Oak's complement of 1,234 men and boys, 835 were killed that night or died later of their wounds.