MA Student hosts heritage and conservation workshop for members of Trent Bridge Cricket Ground

Eva Sanchez worked with a team of volunteers to take members through the process of cleaning and restoring heritage cricket objects

Student Eva Sanchez demonstrating the process of cleaning Harold Larwood's boots

Eva Sanchez (Left), demonstrating with a visitor the process of cleaning Harold Larwood's boots

This month MA Museum and Heritage Development student Eva Sanchez led two workshops at Trent Bridge Cricket ground on conservation of their heritage objects. The workshops were held for members during match days, based in the Museum Room of the ground’s Pavilion Building.

Eva is currently on placement at Trent Bridge as part of her degree, continuing a project at the ground that was established with the entire cohort earlier this year. The group developed the heritage store at the ground, cleaning and recording the wealth of artefacts housed there, as well as training their many volunteers in order for them to continue the work.

The project contributes to Trent Bridge’s new focus on developing its offering as a heritage site for both the local and regional community. With the help of our postgraduate students, the ground hopes to establish a consistent programme of exhibitions, events and workshops to help highlight the rich history of the ground and of the sport in general.

Eva’s interactive workshops allowed members of Trent Bridge to handle precious items such as Harold Larwood’s boots, scoring mechanisms and medals. Visitors were able to learn how to clean the items and discuss the best methods for preserving such artefacts, with guides being available to take away. Many guests had cricket memorabilia at home that they were interested in conserving and learning more about, which posed a fantastic opportunity to ask questions to a heritage expert.

A guest at Trent Bridge's workshop learning how to clean one of the items

A guest learning how to clean a scoring mechanism

Eva told us: “Overall the time spent at Trent Bridge has been an exciting yet engaging area of development for me. Working in such a world famous & compelling location has thus enabled me to develop skills and knowledge in key areas within the heritage sector, such as collections management and audience engagement. Trent Bridge has enabled both academic and professional development, with ability to learn both new & diverse practical skills, and to further build upon current knowledge, it has been a very unique and memorable aspect of this course.”