Abstract

AbstractIn 2010, the Galleries of Modern London opened at the Museum of London, and included a re-making of London’s Pleasure Gardens. Using an embedded ethnographic perspective at the museum, this paper explores the re-making of the gardens, and looks in detail at how and why the museum chose the gardens to explore London’s history as a changing city. The gardens display required an ambitious combination of objects and display technologies, such as historic costume, film projections, Philip Treacy hats, object reproductions, specially made mannequins, and a soundscape, and this paper discusses the production and composition of these components. Reflecting on the gardens’ place in London’s history, the paper identifies what the gardens offer contemporary understandings of the city’s past and the role of pleasure in public history.