Exhibition: Weaving Our Story

19 May – 6 September 2026

Included in museum admission

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On 16 September 2026, Dundee Heritage Trust will celebrate 30 years since Verdant Works was opened as a museum by HRH The Prince of Wales. A new exhibition, The Fabric of Dundee, will open alongside Threads of Dundee a new dedication gallery, with further public activities in the works. 

In anticipation of a new anniversary exhibition, the charity is offering visitors to Verdant Works Museum the opportunity to shape the stories told and the artefacts shown. 

From 19 May 2026, visitors to Verdant Works Museum are being invited to co-curate the exhibition, through a Weaving Our Story mini-exhibition; allowing visitors to vote on which images and items are included, from a wide array selected by the Trust’s curatorial team. The selection includes images of jute stowers, mills dressed for celebrations, and of workers using machinery, alongside award certificates given for spinning, a jute sack dress, and more. 

The Weaving Our Story project runs from 19 May – 6 Sept 2026, with visitors to Verdant Works Museum during this time getting a glimpse into the Trust’s extensive jute collections – some of which have never been displayed before – whilst shaping the contents of the 30th anniversary exhibition. 

Alongside the Weaving Our Story project, DHT is looking to expand its oral histories of Dundee’s jute past. Anyone who wishes to share their stories of life in the city’s mills and juteopolis are being encouraged to contact David Reid, the Trust’s curator, via email at: curator@dundeeheritage.co.uk   

Image (c) Dundee Heritage Trust / Chic Mitchell: Jute stowers in Dundee, 1968