The Arts Society Welwyn Garden visit to The Fan Museum

On the 12th April our group made its way across the Thames to Greenwich and The Fan Museum.

We first heard about this hidden gem from the curator Jacob Moss when he gave our Society a Zoom lecture.

Fascinated by these individual works of art, we were finally able to arrange a visit.

The museum houses a wonderful collection of fans, not all can be on display at once, not enough space is one reason, but also they need to be carefully conserved and can't be open for too long.

As well as being expertly guided round the room downstairs where we learnt about the materials used in the making of fans, and saw some wonderful examples of crafsmanship, we went upstairs to see the current display.

These were lace fans and their intricacy and history was explained to us by the founder of the museum, Helene Alexander herself. I think we all felt quite special to learn from such an expert.

A good day out and we plan to arrange more of these interesting excursions.