Projects & Volunteering
Friends are very active in support of the three Museums in Maidstone – through voluntary work, promoting the profiles of their work and collections, and by raising money to assist them.
Presented below are projects that we are pursuing at present, and often how you can get involved. There are both Small Projects and Major Projects – some we support every year or every other year depending on the longer term commitment.
On a sub page, ‘Past Projects’, we list those projects we have supported over the last 10 years. They demonstrate the significant support we have given the Museums over this period.
Types of Funding Support
Friends’ finance is considered against the situation of the MMF Board’s current accounts and forward budget. MMF meets three types of need for the Museums.
Operational Costs – selectively we support ongoing revenue costs. These Museums, like most across the Country, are facing considerable pressures to their usual income sources. We support where we can.
Small Projects – the identification of on-going shortfalls involving small sums of money (normally less than £5,000 per project). These can be – the restoration of an artwork or artefact, orientation materials, or the purchase of a small item of equipment, etc.
Major Projects – the identification of significant capital works needed, consistent with the Museums’ medium term plan.
The project(s) will always ensure that it can:
- be of long term benefit for the Museums,
- be value for money, and
- be sustainable beyond the project itself.
Naturally, any such major project would be led by Museum staff, but the Friends are a contributor in full project planning.
Normally, the Friends will only pursue one major project at a time, because fundraising may take many years; clarity needs to be given to the Museums’ Friends, and other supporters, about the relevant fundraising ‘campaign’; and all efforts (by the Friends and Museums) need to be concentrated on one objective at a time.
Financial support is gained through applications to grant-giving trusts, local fund-raising activities, individual Friend’s support, and other donations.
You can contribute financially to these efforts by clicking the button at the top of the page – ‘To help these Projects please make a Donation’.
Small Projects
Maidstone Young Artist of the Year Award – 2026
The Young Artist Award is an exciting bi-annual art competition run by us, The Maidstone Museums’ Foundation (MMF) and is open to all young artists, up to 25 years old living in the Southeast of England. The aim of this award is to help encourage the talent and skill of our young artists.
There was £500 in prize money from Maidstone Museums Foundation for the two age categories for winners and runners up. The prize money was handed out by Ivan White as Vice Chair.
Your membership contributions made it possible for us to give this prize money.
Using this year’s theme of ‘Place’, students were welcome to submit up to three artworks.
On Tuesday 10th February, a team of judges from Maidstone Museums Foundation, The Arts Society Mid Kent, Maidstone Museum and Maidstone Borough Council, led by international artist Cas Holmes, had the difficult task of judging the Young Artist Award 2026. There were around 50 artworks by artists in the two age categories of 14 years and under and 15 to 25 years. One of our trustees, Fay Gooch, was on the judging panel and said that the standard of entries were very high indeed.
The winner for the 15-25 years category is ‘Catedrală’ by Maya Danciu and the runner-up was ‘A Walk Along the Beach’ by Alfred Choi.
For the 14 years and under category the winner is ‘Jubilee Celebration’ by Isabel Lacey and the runner-up is ‘The Golden Tower’ by Dea Dacheva.
Highly commended certificates were also awarded to:
‘Identity Journey through Ikat’ by Ashanti Farquhar,
‘House is a Home?’ by Daniel Akande,
‘The Blueprints of a Journey’ by Thomas Millet,
‘A Town Remembered’ by Marie Harris,
‘The Space that Holds Me’ by Isabella Shackleton,
‘My Safe Place’ by Leo Lambert and
‘Deserted’ by Rohan Sundar.
Congratulations to our winners and to everyone who entered. All artworks are on display at Maidstone Museum until Saturday 20th June. The next Young Artist Award will be in 2028, so watch this space!
Heritage Design Challenge - 2022
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Major Projects
Lives in Our Landscape New Gallery
In 2022 the Museum embarked on an ambitious plan to totally renovate the (then) existing Archaeology Gallery – called “Lives in Our Landscape”.
After 18 months of planning, research and hard work the Museum had it ready to be opened by Hugh Dennis on Tuesday 4th June (see home page ‘news’).
The cost of all the work was in the region of £600,000, of which Maidstone Borough Council contributed £390,000.The remainder was met by local charities and businesses.
Maidstone Museums’ Foundation has been fully supportive of this project from the start, and the board set itself a target of raising £100,000. We are pleased that the target sum required was met by the end of 2022.
Volunteering
Friends of the Museums Shop
Since 2019 the Friends have been operating a pop-up shop in Fremlins Walk Precinct – at no cost. We are grateful to the Management Company of Fremlin Walk for making this possible. MMF trustees provide volunteers to staff the premises, on:-
Fridays and Saturdays, 10am to 3pm.
The shop has four purposes:
1) selling work by Kentish artist, Geoffrey Hall. The artwork includes prints, cards, place mats and coasters We also sell other items as appropriate. All proceeds from these sales go to MMF to support the Museums;
2) raise the profile of the Museums. There are various posters and flyers regarding special exhibitions (by the Museums and MMF), 2 large model dinosaurs, a dinosaur egg, an alligator, brass rubbing opportunities, and a display of photographs from historic Maidstone. And we have an Elmer – a model elephant that was on display (along with others) around the town over Summer 2021.
We also provide an advisory service about the Museums.
3) space for MMF talks, receptions and meetings. Board meetings are held here, and the events programme commenced in early September 2021. See the ‘Events’ page for the full list of future talks.
4) opportunities for partner arts organisations to exhibit here. Thus helping to further the broader ‘Creative Maidstone’ image.
Additional volunteers to work in the shop are always welcome – even if it is only possible for an hour at a time.
If you are interested in helping, please contact:-
Wednesday Gardening Club
Friends have a Gardening Club, held at the main Museum (St. Faiths Street) on the 2nd Wednesday of every month. Work starts at 10am and lasts no longer than 2 hours. The objective is to maintain the three open spaces at the Museums – the Courtyard in front of the Tudor part of the building, the Godiva courtyard to the rear of the main staircase near the Bentlif library, and the gardens at the rear of the Tudor part of the building. There is always something to do – dead heading, weeding, clearing areas and planting.
The remaining dates for 2026 are:
Wednesday 25th March
Wednesday 29th April
Wednesday 27th May
Wednesday 24th June
Wednesday 29th July
Wednesday 26th August
Wednesday 30th September
Wednesday 28th October
Wednesday 25th November
Wednesday 16th December
We welcome any Friends who wish to participate. If you would like to offer your services to the gardening club please contact:-
maidstonemuseumsfoundation0@gmail.com
AND ADDITIONAL GREAT NEWS – weekly help
Involve Kent and Maidstone Borough Council are delighted to include Maidstone Museum in their exciting new project to spruce up town centre green spaces. The project, which is funded by the UK Government’s Shared Prosperity Fund, aims to improve Maidstone town centre green spaces over the next two years with the help of local volunteers. All volunteers are led by Involve’s Horticultural Wellbeing Coordinator, Linda Whitehead, and can get involved as often or as little as they wish. No previous gardening knowledge or experience is needed, just a willingness to help out and make a difference in your local area. Linda will share some of her gardening expertise so there is opportunity to pick up some tips and learn new skills. Linda and the team are coming along to Maidstone Museum on every Wednesday morning and have been focussing on tidying the main courtyard and refreshing the beds and planters. The planting scheme will include some Tudor plants to complement the beautiful Tudor building. There are plans to introduce some new planters to the inner courtyard.
For more details about how to get involved, please email grow@involvekent.org.uk or pop along for a chat with us at 10am on Wednesdays at the museum.
