Thank you to everyone who sent in poppies, we were inundated with 1256 poppies!! Here are a few initial images of installation. More to come over the weekend.
To mark this years Armistice Day, the Soldiers of Gloucestershire Museum located in Gloucester Docks has been ‘yarn bombed’ with knitted and crocheted poppies.
Lavinia Drake, volunteer and project organiser, worked with staff to install 1200 poppies from the roof of the museum to the pavement and around the Docks area. The initial target was 500 poppies for the installation, but in just two weeks, the museum received 1200 poppies from knitters from as far as Spain and Germany!
Lavinia had the idea after helping digitalise a first world war diary of the Gloucestershire Regiment. “At the end of each month there is a summary of soldiers, missing, wounded and dead. The numbers of each were shocking, and this was just for one Battalion, it really made me think about the sacrifices these men made. I wanted to do something in a fun visual way, which would make people encountering the poppies to stop and remember those who have died at war.”
Curator George Streatfeild said, “We have her to thank for all the positive reactions we have had from the public. We have involved an audience that would otherwise be unlikely to be interested in the museum.”
The poppies will be on display until the 20th November, donations to the British Legion Poppy Appeal can be made in the museum shop. The shop is also selling the handmade poppies as brooches as well as official British Legion items, with all donations going to the Poppy Appeal.
The Soldiers of Gloucestershire Museum has several Remembrance Day displays up as well as telling the stories of soldiers from the county for the last three hundred years.
