Region: West Midlands

We are delighted to be returning to The Black Country Living Museum for this summer’s 1940s weekend.

We will be bringing along our selection of original antique, vintage and retro jewellery to both the daytime events and the Saturday evening party.

Don your finest threads and have a glimpse of wartime life at the popular West Midlands open air museum, with daytime activities and an evening event promising a memorable night out.

Walk the historic streets of shops, houses and industrial workplaces as they are brought to life with reenactors, vintage vehicles, historic displays, and fascinating stories.

It’s the perfect setting for you to get into the blitz spirit, with everything from the outbreak of World War II and the Dig For Victory and Make Do and Mend campaigns, to a celebratory street party.

Meet soldiers from across the Empire, welcome newly arrived evacuees to the school and join the campaigns to collect scrap metal and other waste for essential wartime recycling.

You’ll have the opportunity to learn how to protect the nation and train for the Home Guard, practice for an air raid with a resident ARP Warden and try out some of the military looks in the Museum’s brand-new recreation of Langer’s Army & Navy Stores.

Commemorating the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings, discover the stories of troops from all over the world as they gathered ahead of the big day, and find out more about the essential role Black Country industries played in powering the landing.

Learn about the continuation of wartime hardships and find out how rationing continued even after the war, as you explore the newly-opened Halesowen and Hasbury Co-Op, set in 1949.

Discover the ingenuity of those making the best of their clothes rations as 1940s fashion will be showcased to commemorate life in the forces and on the home front.