Mumbai’s new children’s museum was ideated by the city’s youngsters themselves

The idea of a children’s museum can conjure up visuals of native dolls and toys, a solar system model, India’s indigenous cultures represented through visuals or installations, a library, a play area, an art and crafts section, and such. 

But Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya (CSMVS)’s new Children’s Museum, unveiled on March 9, is nothing like that. The inaugural display houses original art paintings and sculptures from CSMVS’s inhouse collection, strictly chosen by 25 city kids between ages 8-14. Handheld by the museum’s curators, and educators, for course. 

“Last year, we held a writing and art competition for kids to design a mini-museum. The idea was to choose the best and train them to ideate for this children’s museum we had conceptualised since 2014. The winners were taught about lighting, labels, and other aspects of curating under experts in a total of eight workshops,” says Bilwa Kulkarni, Education Officer, CSMVS. As a lesson in team building, the kids also unanimously chose the objects from a collection of 300, after passionately debating and cajoling the other. They juxtaposed these final objects under four themes: Peace, Friendship, Environment and Courage, created the labels, wall texts, decided the vitrine positions. 

The ‘Peace’ vitrine, for instance, contains a two-feet wide hand-stitched Japanese tapestry of two swans, a foot-and-a-half long Bodhisattva, a shorter seated Buddha presiding over four smaller cherubic Tibetan monks, and inch-high mother duck with her tiny babies. And eight contemporary dhokra-style musicians in a row and over a 100 inch-long Japanese masks occupy the ‘Friendship’ vitrine. Today, the museum is like their doll-house, even a minor change doesn’t go unnoticed. “In ‘Courage’ display, we quietly replaced their chosen sword with a dagger. The next day they asked us in a formal tone,  ‘why did you change the object without our permission?’,” chuckles Joyoti Roy, Head of Strategy and Marketing, CSMVS.

The boxy museum with its full-length windows resembles a glass capsule. It sits at the extreme right of CSMVS’s premises, snug under the bough of some of the museum’s oldest trees. Note the huge fat-trunked baobab to its right. Encircled by new stone benches for the kids, it’s the only one of the three in the city, and is only two years younger than the 97-year-old Indo-Saracenic styled parent museum.

Architect, urbanist and educator Rahul Mehrotra designed the space in white, and light gray and brown, similar to his previous museum engagement – the Visitors Centre for public talks and lectures. A mango and a palm tree grow through the museum, a subtle lesson for the kids to understand the coexistence of flora. An attached open-air amphitheatre and an upper deck for meetings are other interactive spaces on the museum’s body. A mud pit buried with replicas of museum artefacts to acquaint kids with unearthing archaeological finds, and a fertile patch for the nuances of gardening.

Bank of America Merrill Lynch monetarily supported the project and its CEO, Brian Moynihan, who was involved in the museum’s conceptualising, says, he’s “happy to help create this beautiful space dedicated to the children and families of Mumbai, who would like the power to explore the world in ways only a museum can provide..” The kids also assisted Toon Club, an animation organisation, on a three-minute film, displayed here.

“It’s free entry for kids [even in the parent museum]. We are yet to take a call on ticket prices and timings for adults,” says Kulkarni.