Rural Museums Network (Subject Specialist Network)

The Rural Museums Network is for rural life collections everywhere and the people who look after them. It exists to bring museums of farming and the countryside closer together for mutual benefit. We provide a means to publicise rural museums and the work they do more widely.The majority of rural life museums are members. The network is also reaching out to collectors, related societies and other organisations beyond the museum circle.The network has implemented projects covering audience research, developing greater relevance to modern audiences, carbon foot-printing, and techniques for using rural collections to interpret sustainability.In addition the network has managed a continuing process of national collection review and appraisal providing a platform for a truly distributed national collection in a number of key collecting areas.