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My Name is Sophie and I am currently a second year History of Art student at the º£½ÇºÚÁÏ.

I am particularly interested in conservation and aspire to work in the preservation of artwork and objects.

Throughout my studies I have explored artistic processes through a module considering artistic methods and media, inspiring an interest in the action of creating artwork and what this can represent, in addition to the final outcome.

I currently volunteer at St Barnabas Cathedral, sharing its compelling history with visitors which I find very rewarding as it allows me to discuss my interests, such as 19th Century architecture, whilst gaining experience in the heritage sector.

I look forward to undertaking this placement alongside Culture Leicestershire as it is an excellent opportunity to learn new skills working within a museum space and to study objects first hand.

I’m Conrad Padgett, a third-year English student at the º£½ÇºÚÁÏ.

Throughout my time at university I’ve taken part in modules from English literature, to psycholinguistics to Old and Middle English, which gave me a passion for investigating the connections between people, history, and art.

I’ve always appreciated how intersected arts and humanities are.

In my second year of university I took part in the Visioning a Creative and Cultural County (VCCC) project's first student placement: Curating, Researching, Digitising, and Exhibiting Leicestershire Museum Collections in Co-production.

I found the placement incredibly engaging, learning how exhibitions are curated, the effort that goes into selecting items, presenting them, and making them accessible and respectable to the public.

Because of this I was drawn to this placement, and I was eager to help continuing to aid in the creation of accessible exhibitions.

I am a third-year Music and Music Technology student who loves being creative and exploring new pieces of technology.

I am looking forward to being a part of this placement because I will be able to try something new!

My name is Martha, and I am studying Film and Television Studies, currently in my second year.

Throughout my studies, I have developed a passion for topics that extend beyond the scope of my degree, and this placement was an opportunity I could not say no to.

I have modules that focus on art and its conservation, and I have explored how art serves as an emotive tool and how important it is to engage with art through sight, sound, or touch.

This exploration has changed my perspective and awareness of how culture can influence the way we interpret both historical events and society.

I am proud to be the first Film and Television Studies BA Hons student to be invited to participate in this placement, and I am positive that it will be extremely beneficial to me, opening doors to a new realm that I have yet to discover.

My name is Juliette, and I am a third-year Classics BA student.

I have always considered Classics or Archaeology as a path for the future but had never particularly considered museum work.

This project has sparked an interest, however, and the work we are doing is incredibly rewarding.

I can't wait to put it to use not only for Leicestershire County Council, but in my future as well.

Hello! My name is Tyler Sapphire Codrington.

I am an undergraduate second-year student, studying International Media and Communications BA.

My current modules, such as Black Art, widen my interest’s surrounding heritage, history and art.

I admire the power in revealing the histories, purposes and narratives of objects and Art, and their reflections of society.

Another interest of mine is old and new media, which is a motive for my current participation alongside the Digital Transformations Hub (DTH), as part of DTH's marketing team.

I am incredibly excited to participate in this year’s 3D Printing Museum Handling Objects Placement, as I am given the opportunity to analyse objects outside of a book.

Hi I'm Dan, I'm currently studying for my Master's degree in Classics at the º£½ÇºÚÁÏ.

I volunteered in this project for a few reasons, the primary ones being my previous experience with the project, as last year I worked on a preliminary experiment that was wonderfully challenging and a great experience.

Furthermore, this project helps those in need, and I can not think of a better reason to participate in something like this.

Esther Shaw is part of Culture Leicestershire (CuL)’s participation team and works with communities to promote well-being through connecting and sharing culture and heritage.

As part of CuL’s audience development strategy, Esther has worked with faith groups at Bosworth Battlefield Heritage Centre and Charnwood Museum, co-curating exhibitions and developing meaningful and lasting relationships with under-served audiences.

Esther felt inspired to explore LGBTQ+ hidden histories after meeting the curator E J Scott and visiting the Museum of Transology in Brighton.

Esther loves visiting museums and is fascinated by the power of objects, pictures and sounds to prompt people’s stories.

As Senior Curator for Leicestershire County Council’s Museums, Alison Clague makes the collections in Leicestershire Museums care accessible through research, exhibitions, web content and social media.

Alison loves sharing Leicestershire Museums' wonderful objects and the stories they can inspire with diverse local communities across the county.

Alison's team works with volunteers, community groups and higher education providers to spark inspiration and promote a sense of place.

In the past year (2023), Alison has co-ordinated the redisplay of the Hallaton Helmet and worked on the development of Leicestershire Museums Collections LGBTQ+ strand.

Pippa Vidal Davies is the Volunteering Manager at Culture Leicestershire, Leicestershire County Council.

Pippa has spent over 20 years championing the incredible power of volunteers in cultural spaces across the East Midlands and abroad, all inspired by her first volunteering adventure at age 12, restoring an 18th-century naval hospital.

Together with the Culture Leicestershire team, she creates opportunities for people to be the givers and recipients of transformative experiences through volunteering.

Pippa welcomes all those who would like to find out more about the volunteering opportunities on offer at Culture Leicestershire.

The opportunities range from regular, longer-term volunteering to micro-challenges that only take minutes.

Amanda is Cultural Participation Team Manager for Leicestershire County Council’s Heritage and Libraries Services.

Amanda’s passion is co-creating with communities whose voices, stories and connections are not fully represented or shared in cultural sites, assets and services. Amanda has been a specialist in this area for over 25 years.

She is passionate about exploring and sharing how cultural empowerment can change lives. When travelling the world for 6 years she and made it her mission to establish meaningful cultural projects in at least every continent.

These ranged from building new orphanages in Cambodia, using digital technology to support the recording of tribal languages with Aboriginal elders in Australia, working with families with HIV and AIDS in Ethiopia, supporting Tibetan refugees in India and Palestinian refugees in Beirut.

Recent projects Amanda has led on with Culture Leicestershire include Black Lives Matter Too!, 50 years of Ugandan Asian’s in the UK, Exploring Memories of Migration through objects, and Home Is Where We Are!-Gypsy and Traveller Voices.

Amandais proud of leading on the successful Arts Council National Portfolio organisation bid for Culture Leicestershire 2023-26.

This inspired a unique partnership with Nottingham University and Creative Leicestershire to develop of the first co-created Cultural Strategy for the Council.

Amanda acts as Chairperson for the East Midland’s Heritage Volunteering Group and leads on National Heritage Volunteer Leader of The Year Awards

Eliza Gilbert is one of Culture Leicestershire’s Volunteering Co-ordinators.

Although new to the organisation, Eliza supports and delivers a range of meaningful volunteering projects and opportunities across Leicestershire.

Her own volunteering journey began at 16, which was a formative experience that opened her eyes to the possibility of heritage sector careers.

It also strengthened her passion and belief in the transformative power of volunteering, and the importance of creating inclusive spaces and opportunities for everyone.

After nearly a decade of working and volunteering in heritage, Eliza is passionate about championing inclusion and accessibility through inspiring projects like this one [3D Printing Museum Handling Objects Placement].

I have worked with Leicestershire County Council’s “Artworks Collection” for over 30 years with the task of caring for and making art accessible to a diverse range of audiences and organisations - including schools, Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) and galleries.

My work has included commissioning artists to create tactile handling resources that now form the “Held in the Hand” and “Touch Tile” collections.

In the last 10 years I’ve had the responsibility for the management of “Resource Box” - our object handling collections for schools.

More recently I’ve worked on delivering a range of art activities using these resources as part of the Creative Learning Services (CLS) offer.

More information about CLS’s offer can be found via

I’ve spent the past 10 years working across museums, collections, and libraries, and I’m passionate about connecting people with culture in meaningful ways.

In my current role, I run two outreach programmes: the Home Library Service, and Culture to You, a new initiative that lends museum artworks and handling objects to people who may struggle to visit our physical sites.

Alongside these loans, we offer creative and cultural activities delivered directly in people’s homes and community spaces.

I’m fortunate to see first-hand the powerful, often deeply personal impact that access to arts and culture can have, and it’s a real privilege to help bring these experiences to the people who need them most.

More information about Culture to You can be accessed here:

As the Creative Learning Officer for Creative Learning Services (CLS), I manage the Museum Learning outreach sessions into schools (both mainstream and Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND)) throughout Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland.

I am passionate about bringing hands on, object-based learning into the classroom in new and innovative ways.

Drawing upon my 10 years working as a mainstream and SEND teacher and 11 years within museum learning, I have undertaken consultancy work with museums who wish to engage more effectively with schools and advised on accessibility within local museums.

Recently I have also jointly led on the development of CLS’s amazing new offer for SEND schools and pupils enabling all pupils to access learning and objects in their own way.

I care for the archaeology collection at Leicestershire County Council Museums which contains objects dating back 500,000 years.

I am passionate about the ability of objects to connect with people and make them reflect on their own lives and experiences.

I studied archaeology at the º£½ÇºÚÁÏ and have worked in the museums sector for 22 years.

My role involves documentation, preventative conservation, accessioning, rationalisation, exhibitions, loans, events, online content, managing volunteers, facilitating access, forging relationships across the museums and archaeology sector and liaising with our planning archaeology team.

Sian Matthews is a recent graduate of the University of Birmingham where she graduated with a Masters of Arts (Art history and Curating) in 2023.

That same year Sian became part of the team at Culture Leicestershire and was given the opportunity to take on the task of building a brand-new service titled Culture to You.

This service was little more than a concept written into a funding bid when Sian began, and has since flourished into a functioning pilot programme, working to provide access to arts and culture for those who may otherwise struggle, as well as opportunities to volunteer and make a real difference to community wellbeing.

It has been a real challenge! But seeing the ways in which Culture to You can have an impact on the lives of residents and volunteers alike makes all the challenges pale in significance.

I started off my career as a microbiologist, and my PhD at the University of Southampton involved a multidisciplinary approach, applying ecological population theory to bacterial biofilms.

I enjoyed the combination of two disciplines, and the challenges that this presented.

After a change of career, I am now working as the Laboratory Manager for the Archaeology Labs at the º£½ÇºÚÁÏ.

I have several hats, including Safety Coordinator for the Labs and Radiation Protection Supervisor, I also train people on our kit, such as the pXRF, X-ray cabinet, and the 3D scanners.

I love creating 3D models using the Labs’ 3D scanners, and a student and I scanned a range of small artefacts from the Derby City Museums over the summer, including finds from the Viking burial in Repton.

I am also working with our pXRF machine, using X-rays to non-destructively determine major, minor and trace elements of artefacts, and help determine pigments used to decorate items, or the elemental make-up of metal alloys.

Dominic's expertise lies in research software engineering to support human-computer and human-robot interaction.

He has worked across number of Programmes during his years in academic research, including Horizon Digital Economy Research, the Trustworthy Autonomous Systems Hub, the RAi UK and the Somabotics: Creatively Embodying AI Fellowship.

Dominic is Lab Manager for the Cobot Maker Space and responsible for day to day running of the state of art robotic facility based at the º£½ÇºÚÁÏ

Matt manages the º£½ÇºÚÁÏ’s Digital Transformations Hub in the Faculty of Arts.

He provides access and support for staff and students who wish to use the Hub’s equipment and software to enhance their teaching and research with digital content.

He also provides advice and runs workshops on the creation, manipulation and use of digital media in teaching, research and heritage projects.

Matt annually recruits and mentors a team of student volunteers who work on real world arts and heritage digitisation projects organized and supervised in collaboration with academic staff and external partners.

He also manages two scholarship postgraduate Research Associates, who provide support for student projects and users of the Hub.

Student volunteers gain invaluable digital skills and work experience which supplement their studies and enhance their CVs.

Daniel H. Mutibwa is Principal Investigator of Visioning a Creative and Cultural County (VCCC) academic-policy impact project which is a strategic partnership between the º£½ÇºÚÁÏ and Leicestershire County Council.

This strategic partnership is developing a bottom-up Cultural Strategy for the Council aimed at boosting inclusive and sustainable engagement with culture, heritage, and creative industries’ offerings across Leicestershire and beyond.

To better support Cultural Strategy work along with Leicestershire County Council's other key, interrelated, place-based priorities and missions, one strand of VCCC work is developing annual student placements that contribute to achieving VCCC's research, knowledge exchange, and policy impact objectives in inclusive, meaningful, and sustainable ways.

See Daniel's full profile