Norton Allison creates London museum exhibition celebrating history of Girl Guides

The museum appointed Norton Allison to design Here Come the Girl Guides: 100 Years of Guiding in London in January, on the strength of its previous work for the museum, including on last summer’s The Big Dig show.

Here Come the Girl Guides will feature 45 photographs, four pieces of film footage and 53 objects, including a limited-edition Kodak Girl Guide Camera from the 1930s and hearing posts that tell personal stories from former Girl Guides.

The show is object-light, since we have some very strong images that we are focusing on,’ says curator Jim Gledhill. Norton Allison will suspend giant, 2m images on banners, and is creating several interactives for the show. These will include cubes that visitors can spin to make up different guide uniforms. Another will feature wooden replicas of badges that can be lifted to discover how Girl Guides qualify for them.

Norton Allison’s blue, yellow and brown colour palette for the exhibition is based on Girl Guide, Brownie and Rainbow uniforms.

Here Come the Girl Guides: 100 Years of Guiding in London opens on 26 June and runs until 31 October.