The Geffrye Museum in London has announced that its Christmas Past event – which sees the museum authentically transformed for the festive season – will take place between November 2016 and January 2017.
Every year, the museum is decked out with authentic festive decorations, lighting and greenery. Plus music is played around the eleven period living rooms.
The displays allow groups to see how Christmas has been celebrated in middleclass homes over the past 400 years.
What’s more, the exhibition will showcase the origins of and meanings behind well-known Christmas traditions such as feasting, dancing, playing parlour games, decorating the tree, hanging up stockings, sending cards, throwing cocktail parties and even kissing beneath the mistletoe.
Christmas Past will also highlight how Christmas has changed through the centuries.
Visitors will learn how hedonistic festivities of the early 17th century were banned by the Puritans in the middle of the century, and how, after the ban was lifted in 1660, Christmas became a more subdued affair until the early 19th century.
Groups will also find a full programme of events running alongside Christmas Past, including a special open evening, Christmas fair, exhibition talks, a capella carol concert and Christmas decoration workshops.
The museum will also host Farewell to Christmas, which is the Geffrye’s own tradition of burning the holly and ivy with carol singing, Twelfth Night cake and mulled wine on 6th January.
Throughout the Christmas Past exhibition, there will be festive food and drinks on offer in the café, and the shop will be selling unusual gifts, Christmas decorations and cards, homeware and treats.
Christmas Past will run between Tuesday 22nd November 2016 and Sunday 8th January 2017.
The museum will be closed over Christmas on the 24th, 25th and 26th of December and the 1st January.
For more information visit www.geffrye-museum.org.uk.
