Museum of
Ordinary ThingsA little attention changes everything.
A small brown teddy bear with a ribbon around its neck.
The collectionExhibit No. 016

A childhood companion

He came along.

A soft toy with extensive travel experience.

The story behind the object
The storysincere

He came to grandparents’ houses, unfamiliar bedrooms, and the first night away at school. On one journey, we turned the car around to collect him. Nobody suggested leaving him behind again.

His fur is thinner now. One seam was repaired with thread that does not quite match. I can recognise the stitches.

He sits in a cupboard in the spare room. When I move house, he travels in the car with me.

A fictional story, written for this sample exhibit.

What ordinary thing would you keep?

Make an exhibit of your own

Fictional sample exhibit · Back to the collection

Photograph by Oxana Lyashenko / Unsplash ↗

A closer look · The full photograph

A small brown teddy bear with a ribbon around its neck.

An ordinary thing, given extraordinary attention.

The Museum of Ordinary Things

Nothing ordinary
about what we keep.

A ticket. A chipped cup. A watch that no longer works. Some objects matter for reasons no label can quite explain. This is a place to try.

This early exhibit explores how a photograph and a few words can give an everyday thing extraordinary attention.

Create an exhibit with your own photograph and words. Save it privately, then choose when to publish it. The two stories in our sample exhibit are fictional.