ESHER, England – Elmbridge Museum is partnering with artist Emily Peasgood on a new immersive installation for “Echoes of War,” a Home Front-focused WWII exhibition scheduled to run at Elmbridge Civic Centre in Esher from February 4 to February 27, 2026.
The museum describes “Echoes of War” as a heritage project designed to share untold local stories of life on the Home Front during the Second World War. The project is funded by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport via Museum Development Southeast as part of VE and VJ Day commemorations, and is being delivered through workshops, creative sessions and a multi-sensory exhibition model intended to connect different generations within the community. The initiative sits within the UK’s wider publicly funded culture and heritage landscape, in which museums are encouraged to support remembrance, learning, and community cohesion as set out in the statutory framework for local authority cultural services under the Local Government Act 1972.
For the UK museum sector, the commission reflects a broader shift in how heritage institutions build public-facing programming: not only through the display of objects, but through participatory methods that expand the production process beyond curatorial teams. In practice, that can mean community-made elements, performance and spoken-word components, and installations engineered to make interpretation more immediate for visitors – particularly families and school groups – while remaining rooted in a museum’s collection and local archive. It also aligns with current sector guidance on using co-production and oral history to foreground voices that have been under-represented in traditional war narratives.
A museum commission built around touch-activated sound and oral history
A key feature of “Echoes of War” is a recreated WWII-era Morrison shelter reimagined for a contemporary gallery setting. Peasgood’s commissioned work, titled “Threaded Shelter,” is described by the museum as a sound installation that reveals local stories when touched, combining physical interaction with recorded narration. Morrison shelters – steel-framed indoor air-raid shelters installed in homes during the Blitz – are used here as both sculptural object and narrative device, connecting domestic spaces of wartime Britain to present-day family life.
The museum said the stories will be narrated by local schoolchildren from St Andrew’s School in Cobham and Elmbridge residents. The shelter’s patchwork covering will also be physically contributed to by the community: the stitching used in the piece will be sewn by community members, making the textile itself a record of participation as well as a visual reference to wartime make-do-and-mend practices.
Alongside the installation, the museum said the exhibition’s centrepiece will include five dressed mannequins, each representing how members of the local community supported the war effort on the Home Front – from civil defence and voluntary work to industrial or domestic contributions. “Echoes of War” will also include showcases featuring Home Front artefacts from the museum’s collection, positioning Peasgood’s commission in dialogue with original objects, letters and photographs drawn from Elmbridge’s archive.
Cllr Simon Waugh, Portfolio Holder for Leisure, Culture and Commercial Strategy, positioned the exhibition as a civic-facing, participatory project with an emphasis on visitor engagement and local heritage.
The Echoes of War exhibition brings Home Front stories to life through a powerful, immersive experience. It’s a true community project that celebrates Elmbridge’s resilience and keeps our heritage alive. We’re thrilled to work with Emily Peasgood, whose sound installations across the UK demonstrate her incredible talent for turning artistic vision into reality. I encourage you to visit this interactive exhibition and join the family activities on offer.
Peasgood said her approach to the commission is rooted in intergenerational participation and domestic wartime narratives: “I was drawn to this commission for its focus on intergenerational engagement, oral histories, and domestic wartime experiences. My vision for ‘Threaded Shelter’ is an emotionally resonant installation that evokes remembrance and reflection through sound, touch and craft. Community involvement is central to the project: participants will contribute to the stitching, while children narrate wartime oral memories. This collaboration will revive forgotten stories from the museum’s collection, creating meaningful connections between participants, visitors and their local history.”
Programming as audience development: exhibitions, activity days, and public funding
The museum has also scheduled two free family activity days during the run: Saturday, February 7, 2026 and Saturday, February 21, 2026, each running from 10:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Activities are expected to draw on the themes of the exhibition, giving children and parents practical routes into topics such as air-raid precautions, rationing and neighbourhood support networks.
While museums frequently use special programming to broaden attendance, the structure outlined for “Echoes of War” is notable for how it embeds participation directly into the exhibition build. By assigning narrative voices to schoolchildren and residents, and incorporating community-made stitching into a core scenic element, the production method becomes part of the interpretive frame – effectively treating local contributors as creative participants in the visitor experience rather than as an audience segment reached only through education outreach. For local government decision-makers, such models provide tangible evidence of community engagement that can be used when assessing the impact of cultural investment and future budget allocations.
The funding pathway cited by the museum – Department of Culture, Media and Sport support routed through Museum Development Southeast, tied to VE and VJ Day commemorations – also places the project within an institutional framework where commemorative initiatives are translated into public-facing cultural programming. In operational terms, this kind of support typically prioritizes demonstrable public benefit: learning outcomes, community participation, and accessibility, particularly where projects aim to preserve and circulate under-recorded local histories. It also reflects a wider policy trend towards using modest, locally targeted grants to sustain regional museums as anchors for civic identity and informal education, complementing national-level remembrance activity by bodies such as the Imperial War Museums.
For visitors, the museum’s published opening hours for the exhibition are 9:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. at Elmbridge Civic Centre, High Street, Esher KT10 9SD. More information is available via the museum’s website at elmbridgemuseum.org.uk, with background on the commissioned artist available at emilypeasgood.com.
“Echoes of War” is scheduled to open February 4, 2026 and run through February 27, 2026 at Elmbridge Civic Centre in Esher, with free family activity days set for February 7 and February 21, 2026.
