Engagement

Opening Queen Mary’s historic buildings to the public

Queen Mary opens parts of its historic estate to the public so people can explore the architectural and social history of East London. During Open House Festival 2025, 43 visitors joined two free walking tours of the Mile End campus. Led by Queen Mary academics, the tours included the former People’s Palace, the Grade II-listed Octagon and the historic Sephardic Jewish Cemetery. The tours connected these buildings with the history of migration, education, poverty and community life in the East End, giving members of the public free access to heritage that forms part of Queen Mary’s campus. 

Making academic libraries available to the public 

Queen Mary makes its physical library collections available to people outside the University. Through the Independent Researcher membership scheme, members of the public with a genuine research need can apply for reference access to Queen Mary’s collections. Access is available at Queen Mary libraries during normal visitor hours. This gives independent researchers and members of the community access to specialist academic material that may not be available through local public libraries. 

Opening Barts Pathology Museum to public audiences

Barts Pathology Museum preserves a major medical collection and opens it to public audiences through organised events, exhibitions and heritage activities. Public activity during 2025 included a free collaboration with the Old Operating Theatre in August and free Open House London and Heritage Open Day sessions in September. The museum also hosted public talks, exhibitions and other events during the year. These activities give people outside the University access to a collection that documents the history of medicine, disease and medical education in London. 

Keeping green spaces open and cared for

Queen Mary’s Mile End campus includes outdoor spaces used for walking, meeting, recreation and community activity. These include Queens’ Lawn, Library Square, Geography Square and the Regent’s Canal side. These spaces provide areas for people to meet and spend time outdoors in a densely populated part of East London. Queens’ Lawn is also used for community events and gatherings. Queen Mary also works with local volunteers to care for shared green space. In December 2024, the Whitechapel Library garden, which is maintained by community volunteers, won the Tower Hamlets in Bloom Best Newcomer award. The award recognised the contribution of volunteers to making the area greener and more welcoming. 

Creating space for public arts and culture

Queen Mary opened BLOC in January 2024 as a new cinema, gallery, performance and community arts space at Mile End. More than 500 people attended its opening, including students, staff, local community groups and other local residents. BLOC works with local people and schools and hosts community screenings, exhibitions, performances and other cultural activity. Partnerships include the Mile End Community Project and Tower Hamlets cultural programmes. Queen Mary also runs a wider programme of public concerts and music events. During 2024 and 2025, events included Queen Mary Music concerts, orchestral performances and Music Scholars concerts at venues including the Octagon and People’s Palace. 

Preserving and sharing Bengali heritage

Queen Mary works with local organisations to record and share the cultural heritage of East London communities. In March 2025, Queen Mary hosted the Swadhinata Trust’s 25th Anniversary Mela at BLOC. The free event celebrated Bengali history and culture through short films, an archive exhibition, traditional games, publications, comedy and a community Iftar. The event was co-produced with Queen Mary students and gave the Swadhinata Trust a way to share its archive and heritage work with new audiences. Part of the Trust’s archive is also now housed at Queen Mary. 

Recording the history of London’s Jewish East End

Queen Mary historians Professor Nadia Valman and Dr Vivi Lachs launched the Cockney Yiddish Podcast in February 2025. Across seven episodes, the podcast explores the language, music, markets, migration and political life of Jewish communities in London’s East End between the late nineteenth and mid-twentieth centuries. It uses historical research, songs, stories and contributions from guests to make this history available to a wider public. The series won Best Culture Podcast at the Independent Podcast Awards in October 2025, giving wider recognition to the project and the history it preserves. 

Recording histories of anti-racist organising in East London

In 2025, Queen Mary and Rich Mix launched In Living Memory, a project documenting how East London communities have organised against racism and fascism across generations. People with connections to East London were recruited and trained to collect oral histories from organisers and community members. The project is building a digital archive so that these experiences can be preserved and used by future researchers and communities.

Recording South Asian heritage across the UK

Queen Mary researchers are helping to record and preserve South Asian cultural heritage across the UK. In July 2025, the South Asian Britain: Connecting Histories digital resource was launched as part of the AHRC-funded Remaking Britain: South Asian Connections and Networks, 1830s to the Present project. The project brings together researchers from Queen Mary, the University of Bristol and the British Library. The resource includes more than 750 entries on people, organisations and events, as well as 30 newly recorded oral histories, archive material, photographs, maps and network diagrams. It covers South Asian histories across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, including experiences of migration, community life, culture and identity. This project helps preserve South Asian heritage at a national level by recording and making these histories publicly available.