Quaker Tapestry manager reflects
'Some of her achievements, with colleagues, include gaining museum status for the Quaker Tapestry in 2000.'
Bridget Guest has reflected on her twenty-seven years as general manager of the Quaker Tapestry Museum before she retires at the end of the year.
Writing on the Quaker Tapestry website, Bridget said: ‘I have greatly enjoyed my twenty-seven years with Quaker Tapestry and particularly delighted in the friendships I have made over the years with colleagues, volunteers, members and my associates in the museum and business sector around Cumbria. During my career, Roy, my partner of forty years, has been by my side with endless patience, love and support and volunteering in all sorts of ways.’
Some of her achievements, with colleagues, include gaining museum status for the Quaker Tapestry in 2000, which went on to gain local, regional and national tourism awards for excellence in 2008 and 2009. The old warden’s cottage was also redeveloped into self-contained accommodation for volunteers, and a cafe was set up after extensive fundraising. Bridget also took some ‘stitches and techniques’ in 2007 to Australia to enable Quakers there to begin their project of creating forty panels of their own history. In 2013 Bridget and her team of conservation volunteers completed a three-year project to remount and frame all seventy-seven embroideries.
Bridget also received the Wainwright Achievement Award from the mayor of Kendal in 2002 in recognition of her promotion and support of the town. Over the years, many Friends have praised Bridget’s quest to introduce up-to-date conservation techniques.
