News Work Experience at Headstone Manor – July 2026

Yanxi

I’m Yanxi, a Year 12 student studying Classical Civilisation, Greek and Latin. I’ve always loved visiting museums and often wondered about the work which goes behind putting up displays, collecting artefacts, and organising the artefacts. Fortunately, this was all explained in depth to me over the week at Headstone Manor.

Monday began with a look into the archives as we learnt how the sorting system for documents worked. A detailed tour meant that we thoroughly understood the intricacies of preserving books dating back centuries in temperature and humidity controlled units. Handling massive historical Harrow Council records was an amazing experience and very heavy! Tuesday similarly included a look into the museum collection as we tried out wrapping and storing various objects in acid-free paper to prevent degradation over time. This finished with picking out our own objects to write a panel and a social media post on.

In particular, I was fascinated by the box of coins which I found which contained coins from the Roman period all the way up to the 1990s. This felt like a really tangible way of seeing the changes in lifestyle, monarchs, and culture in Harrow through the ages. It truly gave me a sense of how steeped in history the borough is. I focused on a 1965 coin commemorating Winston Churchill’s death, which was very unique due to its large size (weighing a shocking 28g!) and its connection to Harrow as Churchill himself attended Harrow School.

The week finished with a look at the Operations and Events teams and how they keep the museum, cafe and Great Barn running. Looking at the finances behind the products that the museum sells was very technically interesting.

On the last day, I thoroughly enjoyed preparing the duck food and activities for younger visitors. Seeing the children come and play in the Bakehouse and the Granary has definitely been a highlight. Overall, it’s been a super productive and exciting week at the museum which has shaped my understanding of the heritage sector.

Eloise

Hi, I'm Eloise, a year 10 student studying for my GCSE. For my options I chose media studies, triple science, history and Spanish. My history teacher introduced me to the chance of working at headstone manor and I decided to apply as I believed it would make for a good work experience placement. I thought it would be nice to learn a bit more about museums and how they are run.

I have had an amazing week with many opportunities and it was eye-opening to see how much work goes into this museum even though it is only small. I learnt about things specific to this museum and some facts about museums in general. I also enjoyed being in a workplace environment and seeing what it is like to have to collaborate with others. It helped me build my teamwork and communication skills while also strengthening my historical and design skills.

Overall I think my favourite parts of working here is working with collections and marketing. I enjoyed looking at and handling some of the objects in the museum's collection and learning about how they are stored and kept to ensure their survival. It was enlightening to see the extent of items within the museums and how they were cared for. I thoroughly enjoyed marketing as it felt familiar as I was used to most of the terms and ideas we discussed. I really enjoy media at school which gives reason to why I enjoyed marketing so much.

On the last day I prepped some duck food that the museum sells in the cafe. Although this task was very simple I enjoyed the mundane nature of the task.

Event planning was a small task I did and I had an abundance of fun creating this fake scenario with the others. It was creative and allowed me to take a break from the normal, more intellectual work I had been doing.

To sum it up, I had an amazing time working at Headstone Manor Museum and would gladly work here again. There is a lovely work environment with great people and lots of fun, insightful tasks to be done. I'm really happy with my placement and I'm glad I chose to work here.

Sana

I'm a year 10 student from Hatch End High school on work experience. Of all my subjects, I enjoy STEM and history the most, which allowed me the opportunity to work alongside the wonderful people at Headstone Manor, as I chose history as one of my options. It’s been extremely pleasant to watch and learn how a museum is run.

The week consisted of an overview of the museum, a tour of Headstone Manor and the archives, and learning how to handle collections. When creating our final project, we came across beautiful sketches of the Manor House, dated back to 2007. It was fun to find the areas depicted in each drawing, and matching it back to the present, despite the small differences. I’ve really enjoyed being in a workplace environment, and taking a look at Harrow’s history. I’ve learned a lot about the museum, and how much work is put into it.

Furthermore, I also enjoyed helping out at the Manor House, and even taking part in the summer trail, where we had to look for the painted rocks of each specific insect. There are multiple volunteers who help at the Manor House, and we met a lovely volunteer lady who helped at the front desk. Additionally, we spoke with the person who runs the cafe, and learned how to create formulas on excel.

There were multiple memorable moments where we planned our own events, helped to organise the children’s area, and filled cute, stripy bags with duck food.

Overall, I think my favourite part was working with collections and marketing, as we created our own projects and a social media post. We also took photos of the object we chose and researched about the history of the object.