Date: 26 June 2025 

From the Factory Floor: York Castle Museum launches appeal for information about the confectionery community in the city 

Have you or someone in your family worked at Rowntree’s/Nestle, Terry’s, Craven’s/Tangerine or other sweet factories in York? Did the smell of chocolate shape your memories of the city? York Castle Museum wants to hear from you! 

A new community-led exhibition, titled Sugar, Skill and Shiftwork: York’s Confectionery Workers, is set to open at York Castle Museum in autumn 2025, celebrating the people behind York’s world-famous confectionery industries. The exhibition will focus on real stories and uncover hidden voices from people such as factory workers, engineers, designers, packers, social organisers, and anyone who helped keep the industry going. 2025 is the centenary of Joseph Rowntree’s death so it is an opportunity to look back at the legacies of confectionery in York.
 

York Castle Museum is appealing to the public for stories, memories, photographs or objects that reveal York’s sweet history. Your contributions could be displayed alongside items from the York Museums Trust collection to help bring these stories to life. 

Philip Newton, Community Participation Manager at York Museums Trust said: “We are really excited to undertake this research into the local stories of York, delving into the history of those who lived and worked in York’s confectionery heyday. Revealing the voices and experiences of the workers who helped build York’s reputation as a confectionery city is vitally important for understanding our shared heritage and preserving local memory. We are grateful to York Oral History Society who will be sharing their archive with us, and you will be able to hear past voices as well as those who are still with us today.  

“Every contribution will help shape the narrative of this exciting new display, so even though we will only be able to include a limited number of objects and stories from the public in the display, all contributions will be much appreciated and highly valued and help us inform future permanent exhibitions” 

To participate in the project, please head to Sugar, Skill and Shiftwork: York’s Confectionery Workers | York Castle Museum

And complete the form where you can share any York confectionery-related information and images. If you have any questions, please email participation@ymt.org.uk. 

We are also hosting two events at York Castle Museum where you can share your stories directly with us and see some of our collection.  

• Wednesday 9 July 10am – 12pm
• Monday 14 July 11am – 1pm  
• Saturday 9 August 10am – 12pm 

We expect to feature around 50 key objects in total, including up to 15 items loaned by the public, and the rest from York Museums Trust’s collections. 

Information will be collected until 15 August 2025.  

ENDS 

Notes to editors 

Please note we cannot accept any unauthorised loans/donations/submissions at the museum. All offers of loans must be directed to the Community Participation Manager via the online form for approval.  

Online form: Sugar, Skill and Shiftwork York’s Confectionery Workers 

Exhibition webpage: Sugar, Skill and Shiftwork: York’s Confectionery Workers | York Castle Museum 

Website: Community Participation | York Museums Trust 

For more information, please contact: 

Amy Cope  

Public Relations Officer   

Email: amy.cope@ymt.org.uk  

Phone: 07761634646  

High-res images and interviews with Philip Newton available upon request. 

About York Castle Museum 

Website: www.yorkcastlemuseum.org.uk   

York Castle Museum is open Mondays 11am-5pm and Tuesdays-Sundays 10am-5pm. Seasonal opening hours apply, please visit the website for details.  

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Supported by Arts Council England  

York Castle Museum is a social history museum with a collection spanning from the fifteenth century to present day. The buildings York Castle Museum inhabits are eighteenth century prison buildings, the Debtors Prison built 1705 and the Female Prison built in the 1780s. What started as a collection of Victorian bygones by Dr John Kirk in the early 1900s, the museum opened in 1938 and now houses a vast array of exhibits. From Kirkgate, the recreated Victorian Street, to the prison cells that held notorious highwayman Dick Turpin. York Castle Museum and its collections are cared for by the charity York Museums Trust established in 2002. For more information visit yorkcastlemuseum.org.uk.