Young V&A will open in Bethnal Green in July 2023
Young V&A, the UK’s new national museum designed with and for young people will open on 1 July 2023.
Image: Picture Plane © Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Young V&A, formerly known as the V&A Museum of Childhood, is set to reopen on Saturday 1 July 2023, after a stunning three-year transformation. The museum will showcase an incredible collection of over 2,000 works from the V&A's art, design, and performance collection, highlighting the remarkable and optimistic stories of children's ingenuity.
The mission of Young V&A is to inspire the next generation. The museum has been thoughtfully designed in collaboration with children, with a focus on playful learning, creative agency, and imagination. Based on the latest research into early years' development, the three galleries, Play, Imagine, and Design, have been carefully curated to help children build the skills and creative confidence necessary to succeed in our rapidly evolving world.
Image: Young V&A creative Story-Telling session Image courtesy of Young V&A
With curated spaces designed for children from infants to teenagers, family-friendly exhibitions, and a variety of free events, the galleries at Young V&A are brimming with interactive and hands-on activities. Visitors can expect to find colourful and tactile sensory landscapes for young children, performance and storytelling spaces for early readers and writers, an open design studio for children to learn from leading designers, as well as topical contemporary displays and a games design space for teenagers.
The exhibition at Young V&A will include an interactive Minecraft installation in the Play Gallery's game design space called The Arcade, colourful murals by street artist Mark Malarko inspired by creative workshops with children at Weavers Adventure Playground, and a co-curated display of new portraits capturing young people expressing what creativity means to them, among other highlights.
Image: Paper Cranes at the Children's Peace Monument to commemorate Sadako Sasaki and thousands of child victims of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. Japan, 2017. ©︎ Mirko Kuzmanovic / Alamy Stock Photo.
The museum's first exhibition, Myths to Manga, will open on 14 October 2023, offering a fascinating and atmospheric journey through Japanese history.
Location: Cambridge Heath Rd, Bethnal Green, London E2 9PA. Website: vam.ac.uk/young