WONDERS OF THE EAST

As the new V&A East Museum prepares to open its doors, we get the inside track from its director, Gus Casely-Hayford

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The V&A is evolving.

More than 150 years since the museum opened in South Kensington, where it was later formally named after Queen Victoria and her husband, Prince Albert, a new iteration – the V&A East Museum – is preparing to receive its first visitors in Stratford, east London this month.

“V&A East Museum has been created with and for our audiences,” the museum’s director, Gus Casely-Hayford, tells HELLO!, explaining how the team spoke to more than 30,000 local people during the creation of the institution.

“It gives us the opportunity to explore the V&A’s global collection through a contemporary lens, spotlighting topical themes that our young audiences told us mattered to them, from representation to environmental action.”