On an otherwise lackluster Wednesday lunchtime, I find myself in the gift shop of London’s British Museum, helping a man dressed as a medieval soldier carry his haul of memorabilia to the checkout.
Cloaked in a burgundy cape, chainmail skirt swishing side to side, crinkled tinfoil shield in hand, he’s on a mission to buy a trove of paraphernalia celebrating a historic moment for the museum — the arrival of the 11th century Bayeux Tapestry, the first time it has been in England since its creation.
A box of Bayeux biscuits, Bayeux Tapestry horseman keyrings, a maritime tea light holder and a Norman soldier teddy bear are just a few of the items I assist with. When all the items have been scanned, the cash register displays a total of £215.92 ($285).
He offers me a sheepish glance: “It’s not every day you can get these kinds of things!”
The 230-foot-long Bayeux Tapestry is widely considered one of the world’s most significant pieces of medieval art. In 58 scenes, the hand-embroidered cloth chronicles the events leading to the Norman Conquest of England in 1066 — a moment marking the dawn of a new age as William the Conqueror’s triumph over the Anglo-Saxons led to a restructured English language, church and society.
At nearly 1,000 years old, the tapestry is rarely moved from its long-term home at the Bayeux Museum, in Normandy, due to its fragile nature — and when the exhibition was announced, it was met with nothing short of frenzy.
On ticket release day in July, more than 80,000 people joined the online queue to get tickets to see the tapestry, generating more than £2.5m ($3.4m) in sales within 24 hours. Over 100,000 people visited in the first three weeks of the exhibition, and 7.5 million people are expected to attend over the course of the yearlong display. Some visitors have complained of long queues to get in and having to rush their viewing to accommodate the large number of people.
The launch of the exhibit was accompanied by a range of merchandise. The British Museum collaborated with a number of artisans to produce bespoke items, including iconic London department store Liberty , embroidery house Hand & Lock , and smaller makers like Bentham Pottery.
It’s not just Norman-soldier-cosplaying, hardcore Bayeux Tapestry enthusiasts who have been lured in by the museum’s gift shop. The release of the exclusive range quickly generated buzz, including on social media where users shared their hauls or extensive wish lists.
Babette Lucas-Marriott, who goes by the Instagram username @hotchocolateandcountryhouse, accumulated thousands of likes on a video she posted showing a selection of the items on offer in the gift shop.
“I knew there was a lot of excitement around the Bayeux Tapestry itself, but I didn’t expect the gift shop to generate quite so much interest,” she said. “It’s been really interesting seeing how the merchandise itself has become part of the wider excitement surrounding the exhibition.”
Items range from a medieval feather pen (£2/$3) to a “Death of King Harold” plaque replica (£90/$120), to a woven recreation of Scene 2 of the real tapestry (£475/$640). Many of the most popular items — including the Norman ship embroidering kit (£75/$90) and “The Bayeux Tapestry: Collectors’ Edition” book (£150/$200) — sold out online.
“We are delighted that the curated range of books and merchandise have resonated so well with the public,” Tom Costello, head of commercial income at the British Museum told CNN in a statement. He noted record sales from British Museum stores following the launch of the range, in addition to online orders from over 60 countries, “showing the extraordinary reach of the exhibition.”
Dr. Alex Gordon, CEO of cultural insight agency Sign Salad, suggests one reason for the popularity of the collection is that the items have been designed to give the exhibition a sense of permanence.
“You want to own a part of history,” Gordon told CNN. And little trinkets go a long way to mark big moments, particularly in the digital age.
While an image captured on our phones or a social media post to mark our visit may eventually disappear, many items in the Bayeux collection, whether the Anglo-Saxon soldiers ceramic ornament or the lusterware display plates, are ornamental, put on display as a lasting, conspicuous memento of one’s visit.
“Merchandise of the kind we’re talking about is an analog culture, and it’s a counterpoint to the ephemerality of digital culture,” Gordon explained. “This is something you can hold on to.”
Alongside all manner of items to decorate your home, the Bayeux range also features wearable items including multiple variants of t-shirts, scarves and tote bags.
According to Gordon, these kinds of culturally branded items give their owners a certain kind of cachet.
“You want to represent that you have a kind of cultural capital and a cultural cool,” Gordon said. “You’ve got a T-shirt which proves it to yourself and to the world.”
Unlike the ornaments that capture a moment in time just for you to remember, wearing a Bayeux Tapestry t-shirt tells the world something about who you are. Namely, says Gordon, someone who is in-the-know about arts and history, someone culturally aware.
And in the age of mass consumerism, where so many products can look generic, something more niche creates important distinctions.
“We really understood as much as we could about the importance of this exhibition, and I think that helped us root the design,” Mary-Ann Dunkley, design director at Liberty, told CNN.
Dunkley and her team undertook an extensive research process and spent time with archivists and members of the British Museum. They drew out the “most charming” details from the tapestry, while keeping in mind what customers would want to own.
“So, it’s not just merch; it really does go deeper than that,” Dunkley said. “I think that really shows in the design.”
Over the past few decades, according to Gordon, museums and galleries have sought to change the way they are perceived, to appeal to visitors more engaged in pop culture than so-called “high culture.”
“The classic idea of museum culture is preservation and conservation,” Gordon explained. From that traditional mindset, “visitors were a slight annoyance.”
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Gift shops, to this end, serve to “relax” the museum-going experience, Gordon said. Visitors are less bound by the social rules and expectations of “reverence” to the artifact.
Which explains why museums have increased the time and attention put into their gift shops. “They’re investing in them heavily,” Gordon said. He added that The Wallace Collection, a London arts museum, “built an entire exhibition on one Caravaggio painting, and they still had a gift shop of this one painting on bags, pencil cases, serviettes etc.”
The triumph of the Bayeux gift shop suggests it will be hard to sever the gift shop from the contemporary cultural experience.
“An exhibition is no longer just the object on the wall or the artifacts you’re viewing,” Gordon said. “The exhibition is all of the objects and all of the merchandise, as well as the original piece itself. It’s the whole experience of it; therefore, the gift shop is an important part of that.”
