The Young V&A is a Victoria & Albert museum dedicated to the study of childhood. This free museum serves as both a children's museum, with play areas and spaces to move about, and a research museum, with countless artifacts behind glass. I found the collection to be reminiscent of the Strong Museum of Play in Rochester, New York, which I had the pleasure of visiting five years ago.
This museum featured items related to childhood and play that came from many cultures and eras, and covered a variety of topics. Individual collections looked at dress up and the history of performance costume, or games and the progression of board games over the ages. One room was a variety of dollhouses of many styles and ages, which combined to make a whole city. Another room held a variety of artifacts related to letters of the alphabet or colors of the rainbow, surrounded by soft toys and play spots for young children.
Artifacts listed by alphabet, accessible on multiple levels for multiple stages of being. Exhibit in the Young V&A.
This is a museum I would love to return to, for multiple reasons. I enjoy games, gaming, and all things childhood, both as a mother and a perpetual child myself. Even more than that, I feel that play and "childish things" are too rarely given the respect they need. Childhood is very literally the start of life and the formative time for all humans. Society exists because childhood exists, and impacts made on childhood heavily impact society. This can be seen through sociological studies, through shared nostalgia, and through people's held mindsets over what they were or weren't taught as children. In my mind, the study of childhood is vital to the study of humankind and all of its works. The imagery a child sees becomes the art an adult produces. The words a child hears, or doesn't here and wishes to, become the words of an author. The songs a child sings with friends become the bonding joke for a group of adults just meeting. This work is important and I am beyond thrilled to have had the opportunity to take a short trip into this beautiful space.
The design book for Settlers of Catan, otherwise known as one of the games I always win. Exhibit at the Young V&A.
The Landlord's Game, progenitor of Monopoly! I have heard of this game but never seen a copy in real life. I was incredibly excited to view a thing of legend. Exhibit at the Young V&A.
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