We are recruiting for new volunteers at Knole to assist us with our collections management.
What is a Collections Management Volunteer?
A new role at Knole, you will help to catalogue objects newly acquired in rooms that will be opened up to visitors for the first time during our conservation project.
What’s in it for you?
- Becoming part of a friendly and dedicated team
- Use / further develop your IT and / or photography skills.
- Being involved in supporting new exciting projects at Knole
- Enjoying new experiences and learning something new every day
- Opportunity to become involved in other areas of volunteering at Knole
- Gain insight into collections and conservation management within the National Trust
- The opportunity to enjoy being in this beautiful place, with 600 years of history and volunteer at one England’s greatest houses.
- You’ll be part of a nationwide National Trust initiative to publish records of every object in our care online.
What’s involved?
- Working with a small team of volunteers, supervised by the House Steward, to: Catalogue objects and upload data on to the National Trust’s Collections Management System (CMS).
Assign Inventory numbers to objects, and inventory mark objects.
Photograph objects
- Becoming familiar with and then following the National Trust’s Health and Safety Policy at all times
- Assist with research of collection
- There may be other activities where we could use your help
This role will suit people who… are well organised with a friendly and helpful nature and who enjoy being part of a team. Good IT skills are essential, with previous experience of data entry. Good knowledge and previous experience of using a digital camera. Genuine interest in heritage and conservation is important. You may be handling sensitive information and personal details so you will be required to sign a confidentiality form.
Extra Information:
Time committment: At least 1 day per week (Monday to Friday)
Staff contact: Emily Watts emily.watts@nationaltrust.org.uk
What you need to bring: casual clothing, warm layers in the winter months.
Lunch. (Tea / coffee provided).
Training: We ask that you commit to an induction plus CMS and photography training as required.
Expenses: Out-of-pocket travel costs between home and volunteering place will be paid, and other reasonable expenses agreed in advance.
Application Deadline: 21st December 2012
About the National Trust
The National Trust is a registered charity and is completely independent of Government. We rely for income on membership fees, donations and legacies, and money raised from our commercial operations. We are supported by 4 million members and 61,000 volunteers without whom we simply could not manage. We protect and open to the public over 300 historic houses and gardens and 49 industrial monuments and mills. But it doesn’t stop there. We also look after forests, woods, fens, beaches, farmland, downs, moorland, islands, archaeological remains, castles, nature reserves, villages – for places, for ever, for everyone.
About Knole
Knole was built by the Archbishops of Canterbury in the fifteenth century. It was annexed by Henry VIII and remodelled in the seventeenth century by the Sackville family. It is one of the country’s most precious and exceptional historic houses, containing collections of unique royal furniture, silver, paintings and tapestries. The house, set in a medieval deer park, has inspired writers, artists and visitors for centuries. Knole was the birthplace and childhood home of Vita Sackville-West, who went on to create the gardens at Sissinghurst. Knole was also the setting for Virginia Woolf’s novel Orlando.
Knole became a National Trust property in 1946, when the house and some 100 acres of parkland were given to the charity, with areas within the house leased back to the Sackville-West family. Historian and author Robert Sackville-West, seventh Lord Sackville, lives with his family in private apartments within the property. The Sackville estate runs the majority of Knole’s parkland, including the deer herds.
Inspired by Knole
The decade-long Inspired by Knole project aims to create a conservation studio which will be open to the public, where we will conserve our collections for the future. We aim to rewire and fit Knole’s showrooms with insulation and conservation heating and open attics, tower rooms and a new cafe. We also plan to offer a programme of heritage skills training and create a wider community of volunteers working at Knole. The estimated cost of the entire project is £17.3m, with £3m coming from fundraising and £6.8m from the National Trust. Knole will bid for £7.5m from the Heritage Lottery Fund, which has already granted Inspired by Knole a first round pass, in 2013.
