Explore collections

The core of the collection was acquired when the Clifton Suspension Bridge Visitor Centre opened in Bridge House, Sion Place in 1998. It consisted of social history paper-based artefacts dating from when the bridge opened in 1864 to the 1950s, such as postcards and prints featuring Clifton Suspension Bridge (approximately 800 items), as well as photographs and Victorian souvenirs, such as chinaware (approximately 50 artefacts). A further collection of contemporary items from companies using the bridge in their logo was acquired at this point.

Following the closure of the original Visitor Centre, the exhibition was rehoused in a temporary prefabricated building. In December 2014 a purpose-built museum located on the Leigh Woods side of the bridge was opened by HRH Princess Anne. The museum tells the story about the competition to design the bridge, its construction and completion and how it is maintained today. Original items from the Trust’s collections are used to tell this story and are part of the permanent display; they range from a piece of iron bar that was slung across the gorge by Brunel, to clay pipes found in the bridge’s vaults, to tickets and medallions commemorating the opening of the bridge in 1864, to an engineer’s notebook from the early twentieth century.

Source: Collection development policy

Date: 2021

Licence: CC BY-NC

The museum continues to be offered gifts and has also acquired items by purchase. Since 2018 it has an acquisition budget which is determined year on year as part of its wider budgeting process. The current collection consists of:

• Objects relating to the Avon Gorge and the design and construction of the bridge (c.1780-1864) including prints, drawings, a watercolour painting and papers relating to Serrell’s scheme to finish the bridge.
• Artefacts relating to the opening of the bridge (1864) including photographs, newspaper reports, poster, commemorative medallions, tickets to the opening celebrations.
• Social history souvenirs (c. 1828-1930) that celebrate the bridge as a touristic landmark including chinaware, postcards, photographs and decorated souvenirs.
• Found objects and tools including a clay pipe, broken or test sample parts of the bridge, and old maintenance equipment.
• Commemorative and souvenir Items relating to Isambard Kingdom Brunel, c. 1959 – 2015 including commemorative stamps; bronze maquettes of Brunel by sculptor John Doubleday; plaster relief of bust of Brunel.
• Interpretative and informative material about the bridge including commemorative booklets and guidebooks c. 1920s-2017, audio-visual material in video/DVD formats.

In 2017 the CSBT received the Adrian Andrews Collection as a gift. As well as Andrews’ research archive (paper and digital), it consists of:

• Stereoscopic viewer and 217 stereocards, dated c. 1850-1930, including 100 images of Clifton Suspension Bridge, Clifton and the Avon Gorge as well as images of other bridges from around the world.
• Three medallions commemorating: London Bridge (1831); Iron Bridge (1792) and the Thames Tunnel (c. 1845).
• Pre-1970 Clifton Suspension Bridge guidebooks.
• Original prints of various bridges (c.1770s-1880s) and grangerised extracts from nineteenth-century publications featuring bridges such as the London Illustrated News.
• Photographs including the opening of the bridge, various Victorian views and maintenance being carried out on the bridge in the 1950s.
• Two Victorian pencil and water colour sketches; one showing the bridge under construction (dated c.1843-1862).

Handling collection, models and educational resources:

Some objects, such as duplicate unwritten postcards, have not been accessioned into the Trust’s main collection. These include models of the bridge and puzzles of bridge created for educational purposes to be used in the Visitor Centre. These items are listed with an ‘H’ prefix and recorded separately as part of the Trust’s educational handling collections. They are not considered to form part of the Trust’s collection.

Items which are surrogates (such as digital copies, photocopies, publications) form part of the Trust’s educational resources. Surrogate digital items will not be accessioned into the main collections.

Source: Collection development policy

Date: 2021

Licence: CC BY-NC

Clock Collection

The Clockmakers’ Collection was begun in 1814 and is the world’s oldest collection specifically of clocks and watches. It comprises about 1,000 objects, from the 15th century to the present day, including pocket watches and their movements (especially of the 17th-19th centuries), precision watches, domestic and scientific weight and spring clocks (especially of the 17th century), clock movements, marine time keepers (especially from the 18th and 19th century), pocket sundials, clock and watchmakers’ tools and a wide range of small horological items. Much of the collection was made by members of the Company or by foreign makers who influenced its work. It has been on permanent public display in Guildhall Library since 1874, in an area where many of the clockmakers worked. The Collection is shown in a single room, containing at any one time some 600 English and European watches, 30 clocks and 15 marine timekeepers, together with a number of rare horological portraits. The majority of items in the Collection range from c.1600 to c.1850. Perhaps the most important group within the Collection is the marine timekeepers, illustrating the importance of horology in the science of navigation. Examples are a marine timekeeper of 1724 by Henry Sully, a silver deck watch by Thomas Earnshaw (used by Captain George Vancouver in the discovery by Europeans of the Island now bearing his name) and the celebrated 5th marine timekeeper made by John Harrison and completed in 1770.

Subjects

Clocks; Watches; Horology

Portrait Collection

The Clockmakers’ Company Collections include 39 oil portraits, engraved portraits, wax portraits and early photographs, showing 18th and 19th century London clockmakers and significant 19th century members of the Company.

Subjects

Portraits; Horology

Printed Books and Manuscripts

The Clockmakers’ Company Library was founded in 1813. It consisted at first of the ancient manuscripts of the Company but soon grew to include many printed books, often presented by their authors, or annotated by famous clock and watchmakers. It is now celebrated for its holding of rare clockmakers workbooks and related documents (such as Victor Kullberg’s Records and many 18th century holograph manuscripts by John Harrison). There are over 900 printed books, mostly English though with some published on the Continent, and over 175 groups of manuscripts. Many early 19th century acquisitions were annotated by their authors or notable members of the Company. The manuscripts cover the Company’s own history, but in addition they include a group of important manuscripts relating to the work of John Harrison (1693-1776). There are also business records of significant London clockmakers, with account books, order books and ledgers. In 1925, by agreement with the Corporation of London, the Clockmakers’ Library was placed in the City’s Guildhall Library so that it could be made freely available for consultation by the public and it remains there together with the Company’s Museum Collection.

Subjects

Clockmakers; Horology

Source: Cornucopia

Date: Not known, but before 2015

Licence: CC BY-NC

Science and Industry Collection

The main collection of the museum comprises the land, buildings and contents of the worsted spinning mill which was acquired from Fox Brothers Ltd when the factory was closed in 1981. The working mill consists of: the main factory on five levels; the grist mill on four levels; the engine house; the boiler house; the economiser house; the factory chimney and associated flues; the carpenters shop; the dye and weavers cottage and storeroom; the gas retort house; the animal house; and various workshops. The main factory has on five levels: the combing shed with a complete set of preparer machines dating from c.1890-1920; the worsted spinning shed houses the machines for the now obsolete Bradford Open Drawing Process for spinning worsted yarn, the frames date from 1898-1959; and in the woollen and weaving display there is a scribbler and carding set and a woollen mule and a Hattersley Standard loom dated 1955, a warp winding machine and ancillary winding machines. The engine house has a 1910 300 horsepower Pollit and Wigzell horizontal cross-compound drop valve steam engine that powered the mill up to its closure. The boiler house contains two boilers of 1889 and 1910 and ancillary equipment. The weaver’s cottage is furnished as a cottage industry display with various appropriate artefacts There is a small collection of other obsolete objects still in everyday use, including oil cans; worker’s notices; and old machine tools. A beam engine, scrapped during the life of the mill has been rescued and added to the collection.

Subjects

Science and Industry

Social History Collection

There is material relating to the Fox family, the owners of the mill.

Subjects

Social History; Costume and Textile; Oral History; Photography

Source: Cornucopia

Date: Not known, but before 2015

Licence: CC BY-NC