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Campaigners protesting against the sale of Walsall Leather Museum have said the institution is the town’s “last remaining heritage asset”.
The museum tells the story of the town’s leather industry and those who worked in it. The local council agreed plans in September to sell the museum building to a local college to provide support for students with special educational needs and disabilities (Send).
Lauren Broxton, 35, a business owner and leather designer and one of those protesting against the sale, said the council was “pitting heritage and Send provision one against the other” and that there were no detailed plans about where the museum will be relocated.
Broxton said there were fears among campaigners that the move would put an end to leather-working skills in the area. “It could be that those collections are mothballed or put into storage for two to five years,” she said.
The designer, who teaches courses in leather working at colleges and universities, said the West Midlands town had a global reputation as a leader in leather production. According to the museum, the origins of the town’s leather industry start in the middle ages.
“You can’t walk around this town and not see some sort of reference to leather working or leather. So you go in the pubs, there’s pictures of old saddlery catalogues, the saddles on the wall,” she said. “It’s so ingrained into the cultural heritage.”
Richard Brown, the chief executive of Abbey England – a wholesale supplier of English leather, saddlery and leathercraft tools – echoed Broxton’s concerns. He said the museum was the “one place where you can see what a saddler makes, what a foundry would make, what the bridle makers would make”.
In response to the criticism, Walsall council said it was not closing the museum and was committed to relocating it to a central location in the town.
“We are liaising with many stakeholders about how the museum can become more viable in the long term. There is a need to increase footfall and improve its offer, so it provides value for money and better represents the history and heritage of our borough,” a spokesperson said.
Campaigners, however, are concerned the council will be unable to find new premises for the museum.
“It doesn’t seem to be logical what they are trying to achieve and they’re not explaining themselves well enough,” Brown said. “At least Walsall has a trade and it should be [about] finding an overarching way to help that trade to stay relevant in the modern world.
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“Walsall saddlers are desperate for business and desperate for the world to remember them, and if the museum shuts it will feel like no one wants to remember them.”
Broxton started attending the museum, which is free to visit, at the age of five and described it as “absolutely instrumental” to her decision to start her business. Discussing the workshops and school visits it offers, she said: “I think the museum’s a fantastic example of how we can engage younger people and a wider range of people at a really early age.”
The move has also been criticised by the local Labour MP, Valerie Vaz, who said the museum was not currently suitable for Send provision.
She said the council had “tried to justify its complete disregard not only for cultural heritage and popularity across the UK and internationally, but the impact on Walsall’s leather industry and its potential to build on its world-leading reputation”.
