This explores how the Ulster Folk Museum navigates the intersection of historical ethos and contemporary relevance and asks how the museum’s founding principles continue to inform institutional progress, interpretive strategies and public engagement. Focusing on the museum’s current Reawakening project, which seeks to position the museum as an environment and heritage resource for current and future generations, this paper examines the tensions and continuities between original institutional ambitions and current transformations. It considers the challenges of adapting historic spaces and narratives for modern audiences, and what it means for an open-air museum to engage with its own past whilst envisioning what its future might look like.

Carys Tyson-Taylor is a PhD researcher currently working on a CDP studentship with National Museums NI and University of Leicester. Her project aims to produce a critical and nuanced analysis of the establishment and early development of the Ulster Folk Museum, exploring how an understanding of the museum’s founding ethos and key motivators behind its conception might inform and support its current and future transformation, particularly in the context of its Reawakening project, which aims to expand the museum’s role as a heritage and environment resource – making it more relevant and more resilient for current and future generations.

Recent publication: https://www.epoch-magazine.com/post/emyr-estyn-evans-and-the-making-of-regional-heritage-in-northern-ireland