Dazzle ship 1

Medway history brought to life with paper ships

Hundreds of children learned about history and engineering thanks to an educational initiative supported by the Rochester Bridge Trust.

During the summer and autumn of 2018, Cabinet of Curiosity received support from the Trust and Chatham Historic Dockyard to run its WW1 Ships on the Medway project.

This was a programme of workshop activities that saw more than 500 children and their families use paper kits to assemble models of their own dazzle ships, inspired by the last battleship to be constructed at the dockyard, HMS Africa.

Cabinet of Curiosity designer and visual artist Caroline Collinge explained: “We created these paper kits to enable young people aged five to 14 to get their hands on history, learning both the story of the dazzle ships and developing their spatial awareness skills with the physical creation of their own model ships.”

Edmond Salter, architect at Cabinet of Curiosity, added: “We are grateful to the Rochester Bridge Trust and Chatham Historic Dockyard for their support.”

The activities took place at a variety of locations across Medway, including libraries, schools, the dockyard and at a community festival.

Andrew Freeman, Operations Manager at the Rochester Bridge Trust, added: “This was a brilliant project and an important education programme. The Trust was pleased to be able to support Cabinet of Curiosity’s work and to see the impact it had on the children who took part.”

Share this story

Facebook
Twitter
Email
Print