This rubber cap was made around 1920. When inserted into a woman’s vagina, it prevented sperm from reaching the uterus, and so prevented pregnancy.
This device, used in operating theatres in the 1870s and 1880s, filled the air with a pungent, yellow mist of an antiseptic called carbolic acid.
These baby-weighing scales, made around 1900, were used by health visitors.
This is a wooden acupuncture model made in Japan in 1681.
This spray can was used to help slow the spread of malaria, a life-threatening disease carried by mosquitoes.
This saw was used to amputate (cut off) people’s arms or legs. It is about five hundred years old.
This gallery tells the story of the Information Age over the last two hundred years.
Find something that you think is strong; find something made from plastic…
Find something that’s heavier than you; find something that generates friction…
Find something more than 100 years old; something you wish you’d invented…
Find something you wish you had invented; strike a pose and take a museum selfie…
Find something you think is beautiful and useful; something that solves a problem…