New director for LMA

As many of you may already know, LMA’s new Director, Emma Markiewicz, took up her new position with us in mid-February. Emma comes to the City from The National Archives, having held several roles in different departments over the course of her time there. Despite a whirlwind of inductions from colleagues in the City of London and LMA itself during her first couple of months, Emma has found the time to share some first impressions of her challenging and exciting new role.

I am writing this at the end of my first month as Director of London Metropolitan Archives. There is so much going on in this incredible organisation it’s been quite a whirlwind few weeks. I have joined LMA from several years at The National Archives, where I was lucky enough to work across many aspects of archives and archiving, from research and collections to public engagement and government relations. So, it has been interesting to see where the similarities and differences are between two of the largest archives services in the country.

Finding my way around the LMA building was a challenge I was fully expecting, having never been in possession of a good sense of direction, and I still haven’t cracked that one yet. But I have, however, learnt a huge amount about the important work the team at LMA does to make records available, whether to researchers and community groups, or through a vibrant programme of events and activities for learners of all ages. As well as meeting staff and finding out how we manage the complex requirements of looking after a collection of this size and diversity, I have also been getting to grips with the workings of the City of London Corporation, our parent body, and the Guildhall Library and the Small Business Research and Enterprise Centre, which are based at the Guildhall and with whom we work very closely.

In common with many public organisations and services over the last two years, archives services have learned a lot about different ways in which our users and communities want to work with us. At LMA, amongst other things, we have trialled our events in virtual and hybrid formats, we have used the time to improve our catalogue and grow our digitisation programme, and we have grown our online offer through making improvements to resources such as the London Picture Archive.

Some things on the other hand sadly we couldn’t do very well during Covid restrictions, such as welcoming community groups and schools into the building or running on-site events and exhibitions. However, we were delighted on 11 March to host our first community project on-site since March 2020, a collaboration between New Earth Theatre and Aid for Japan, who have created a film and exhibition in response to their work supporting orphans of the 2011 Japanese earthquake and tsunami. These events always manage to be both moving and fun, and are a reminder of the powerful connections people can make through archives. It is so important to share our collections and spaces with everyone, and I would encourage you to get in touch if you have similar collaborations in mind. We’ve also launched our first new on-site exhibition in two years, Magnificent Maps of London which features the first surviving map of London, Civitas Londinum.

Finally, I wanted to say that I’m very interested to hear from our users to better understand the different capacities in which you use and work with LMA’s collections and services, so please watch this space for news of how we will be reaching out to you in the coming months to gather your insights and feedback.