2022 Timewarp: The Wonder Room

28 January - 31 December

Timewarp 2022: The Wonder Room

Imagine your house is a museum. What would you choose to collect and display?

The idea for our Timewarp comes from Mary Ann Lukis, a Guernsey artist who was born 200 years ago. Mary Ann was also known as 'Polly' and dedicated her life to illustrating her father's work*.

Mary Ann always lived at her family home in the Grange, in the building now known as 'Lukis House'. Part of the house became a 'valuable and interesting private museum' during the 1800s.

Our Wonder Room is inspired by this museum and other personal museums of the time.

The name 'Wonder Room' is inspired by the German concept Wunderkammer, which literally means 'room of wonder'. In English they are usually called 'cabinets of curiosities'. These 'cabinets' were actually rooms filled with extraordinary, wondrous and exotic objects. This fashion started in Europe during the 1500s and some museums still resemble the look of these 'wonder rooms' today - for example the Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford.

Expect taxidermy, natural history, dressing up, plenty of hands-on activities and a flavour of the Victorian quest for knowledge & discovery. Entry is free with your Discovery Pass.

* Mary Ann's father was Frederick Corbin Lukis, a famous Guernsey archaeologist and polymath. (A polymath is a person who knows a lot about many different subjects). F.C. Lukis was an archaeologist but also an expert about nature and geology. Mary Ann might have been a polymath too, but we do not have any evidence of this. In the past, the lives of girls and women were often not recorded in detail.

If you haven't visited the Timewarp before, it is the role play area of the Discovery Room. The theme is changed every January and the team strive to make it accessible and interesting for visitors of all ages, but especially children & children at heart. Click here to see some Timewarps of the past.