From Friday 6 August, families will be able to enjoy the Museum an extra day of the week, as well as some brilliant family activities.
There is a family friendly storytelling session on Friday 20 August, with author Robert Guidi.
Guidi’s novel, Isambard and the Cato Street conspiracy, tells the story of a 16-year-old Isambard Kingdom Brunel who stumbles upon a radical plot to kill the Prime Minister. In this
interactive storytelling session, families are in the driving seat, helping Guidi create a brand new story – which is different every time!
If you prefer concrete to conspiracy theories, Fragments and the City is a temporary exhibition showcasing the work of the most recent cohort of Open City Accelerate students. A pioneering programme to diversify the future built environment workforce, the students visited the Museum in December, taking inspiration from the Brunel Museum and its unique location along the Thames foreshore to inspire their work. Their portfolios are being displayed in the unique location of the Thames Tunnel Shaft – 16 metres underground – between 13 and 15 August. Entry is included in your Museum ticket.
Families are invited to pick up a copy of the Thames Tunnel Trail and to help Isambard Kingdom Brunel complete his Dad’s blueprints after they got smudged in the flooding. Just like Marc Brunel, they’ll need to work out how to use the soft earth to access underneath the river, and how a small worm might hold the key to creating the worlds first underwater tunnel. Luckily our expert guides will be on hand to answer any questions you might have. The free trail for families is included in the Museum entry ticket.
Isambard and the Cato Street Conspiracy Interactive Storytelling
Friday 20 August | 11.30am, 1.30pm
£10 Family ticket, pre-booking essential – includes entry to the Thames Tunnel Shaft
How do you defeat evil when science is not enough? You get Magic…
In this storytelling session, author Robert Guidi will construct a unique new story based on suggestions from the audience (and a sprinkling of Brunel related history). He will finish with a reading from his new book, “Isambard and the Cato Street Conspiracy”
London, 1820: Isambard is just like any other 16-year-old engineering genius until he stumbles across a radical plot to kill the Prime Minister. Things get complicated when he discovers that the conspiracy is being led by a French revolutionary supposedly executed 25 years earlier. With the help of the eccentric Candlewick sisters, whose magical shop has a habit of losing itself in the labyrinthine streets of Georgian London, Isambard defies his father and joins forces with the Bow Street Runners. But none of them have any idea about the ancient magic they are taking on.
Will a home-made messaging machine, a pair of telepathic stones and a talking gas be enough to help Isambard thwart the Cato Street Conspiracy?
Author Robert Guidi reads from his latest novel, Isambard and the Cato Street Conspiracy in
this interactive storytelling session.
More details and to book: Isambard and the Cato Street Conspiracy Interactive Storytelling – Brunel Museum (thebrunelmuseum.com)
Fragments of the City
Temporary Exhibition runs Friday 13 to Sunday 15 August inclusive
Included in entry to the Museum | Book now
Last December, the Brunel Museum hosted the students from Open City’s pioneering Accelerate project, giving them tours of the Thames Tunnel Shaft on the site. The students then used the Brunel Museum, the Thames foreshore and the local environment as the basis of their research for the workshops. This temporary exhibition showcases the work of experiments, explorations and responses by students.
Thames Tunnel Trail
It’s 1835 and the Thames Tunnel has lain unfinished for the past 7 years. Work is about to begin again – but there’s a problem. In the last flood, the blueprints got wet and now some of the detail has been smudged out. Can you help Isambard Kingdom Brunel work out what’s missing from the blueprints – before his Dad finds out?
Just like Marc Brunel, you’ll need to work out how to use the soft earth to access underneath the river, and how a small worm might hold the key to creating the worlds first underwater tunnel. Luckily our expert guides will be on hand to answer any questions you might have.
This free trail for families is included in your Museum ticket