Thinking Outside The Box - Black Country Living Museum, Dudley, West Midlands

Black Country Living Museum is one of the UK’s five largest open-air museums and features original lime kilns, two coal shafts, a canal arm, transport of the period, and more than 50 reconstructed buildings where trained costumed Learning Assistants and Demonstrators bring to life the stories of real people who lived in the Black Country when the region was at the peak of its industrial power.

To address a decline in visitors numbers suffered in 2012 and 2013, the Museum devised a new business strategy to make it financially resilient. This included leveraging the site as a film set for film and TV such as the BBC Two series, Peaky Blinders

Today, thanks to the Museum’s willingness to think outside the box, today it is more financially secure and is able to embark on the largest development in its history: a £23.2m project to create a 1940s-60s town and industrial area – and a new visitor centre and dedicated learning centre [insert BCLM ‘fly through of new development].