Nurses Station Recreation – Mencap, Cymru

Mencap is the UK’s leading charity centred around helping people with learning disabilities, the Hidden Now Heard exhibition focuses on their stories and time spent at six long stay hospitals in Wales. The hospitals closed in 2006 and testimonies from 80 former residents were collected to form the basis of the exhibition. Currently touring around Wales with a permanent home in St Fagan’s Museum, the exhibiton helps preserve the history of these hospitals and creates a better understanding of a so far underrepresented aspect of society.

Brushed Aluminium Panel

Mencap originally commissioned us to help with the development of the touring exhibition, which produced great results and garnered much positive feedback. We were recently approached again to install a new Brushed Aluminium Panel and installed a Period Telephone for the temporary exhibition in Storiel, Bangor. The panel is part of a recreation of a Nurses Station from Bryn y Neuadd hospital in Llanfairfechan.

For this, we laser cut an aluminium panel which details various functions of each switch, such as the lighting, fans and alarm reset. This helped add an element of realism to the recreation and gave an insight into the daily role of nurses. The telephone would play a select number of messages detailing the daily jobs of the nurses each day. Visitors felt that the recreated nurses station provided a greater sense of the wards layout and brought them closer to the stories of the hospital itself.

The exhibition will be held in Storiel, Bangor until November 5th and full details of the exhibition can be found on Mencap’s website.