Between Christmas and New Year, the National Football Museum welcomed over 5,500 people through its turnstiles. Thank you to everyone who visited or supported us across the festive season!
Preston Christmas Markets
During Twixmas, the museum was fortunate enough to have a stall at the Preston Christmas Markets, surrounded by other local businesses and traders. It was a fantastic opportunity to engage with the Preston community, to chat about the work the National Football Museum do and what we have on offer in Manchester, as well as at our dedicated Research Centre in Preston.
From Wednesday 27 to Friday 29 December, our team introduced market visitors to a snapshot of our current Score Gallery exhibition, Batteries Not Included. Activities included an object handing section, where people could chat, reminisce and interact with toys from our exhibition, as well as creative craft and game-making workshops for younger visitors.
Across the three days, almost 100 people came to our Batteries Not Included pop-up, interacted with the activities and stopped to chat to our team about the museum and football in general.
Leona Bylinski, Communications and Marketing officer for Preston Marker / Preston City Council said:
“It was a pleasure to host the ‘Batteries Not Included’ activities at Preston Markets over the Christmas period. Positive feedback was received from traders and customers alike including my son who enjoyed showing off his table football skills!
“Communicating and interacting with Aimee and the team beforehand regarding location, logistics and marketing was very straightforward and efficient. I look forward to working with Aimee in the future, bringing further events to Preston city centre.”
Batteries Not Included: Festive Fun
In the run-up to Christmas, we offered visitors the chance to design and create their own football-themed toys and games, inspired by some of the traditional pastimes currently on display in the Score Gallery.
From Monday 18 to Friday 22 December, visitors sat down in the Pitch Gallery to recreate a Trench Football-style puzzle in our Marble Run craft activity, or made their own Flick Football games, inspired by Subbuteo and its early twentieth-century precursors.
Batteries Not Included is available to see at the museum until the end of February 2024.
Sporting Memories
Our established and well-loved Sporting Memories group came together for one last hurrah before the winter break for their Christmas party. The group has been chatting all things football since 2016, sharing their memories, anecdotes and opinions on the game in a fun and relaxed atmosphere.
Discussing the different matches across the festive period over a few mince pies was the perfect way to end a year. They also took part in a Christmas quiz and a festive game of spot the ball!
You can find out more about our Sporting Memories group via our Communities page here.