What we do

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The Met Museums care for the collections and history of the Met. In addition we promote wider knowledge of the story of the Met especially marking important anniversaries with our colleagues both in the MPS and the wider police community.

We are here to help colleagues and the general public preserve, engage and interpret the history of the Met.

You can contact us to discuss various topics, such as:

donating something to our collection
help with research enquiries
borrowing an item from us for an exhibition

Donate an object

We are always looking to add to the collection so we can tell the full story of the Metropolitan Police and the crimes they have investigated. We collect uniform, photographs, documents, equipment, books and many more items. If you have something that you would like to offer to us please email us at [email protected] or write to us. You must include a list of the items, photographs of all of them and any biographical details you have of any named officers or police staff associated with them.

We usually hold a monthly acquisitions meeting to discuss donation offers and ensure they fit our collecting and retention criteria, which we have developed in line with Spectrum standards, the best practice across the whole UK museum sector. Donations cannot be sent to the museum before a decision on the offer has been made.

We are currently pausing donations until 30 September 2026. You can still offer us items during that pause but they will not be processed until late October - alternatively you can contact us about them from 1 October inclusive onwards. The first deadline for information and images after the pause will be 22 October.

We are particularly keen to strengthen areas in our collection such as:

Policing and the Covid-19 pandemic
LGBTQ officers in the recent and not-so-recent past
Black, Asian and minority ethnic officers in the pre- and post- 1947 periods
Women police officers in London before and after 1919
The Met’s Civil Staff and their part in Met history since 1829

We only collect items relating to the Metropolitan Police and Metropolitan Special Constabulary. Items relating to other police forces, national and international policing, organisations such as the IPA, INTERPOL, NARPO or the College of Policing, or policing in London before 1829 fall outside our collecting criteria and cannot be accepted. If your items relate to any of those topics, please contact the relevant organisation directly.

Archives for county police services and their predecessors are often held at the relevant county archive - a 1989 list for England and Wales is available via the Open University. Many current police services like Kent, Essex, Thames Valley, British Transport, West Midlands, Devon & Cornwall, County Durham and Greater Manchester also have museum collections or history societies.

Research enquiries

The MPS Museum team can book you into our reading room to research the history of the Metropolitan Police, objects, archives and photographs in the collection, famous cases and officers, genealogy and local history. We cannot carry out research on your behalf, but can advise on the use of images of items from our collection in conjunction with the MPS's Commercial Department.

Loans

To enquire about borrowing objects from the Met Museum collection for your exhibition or for more information on our loan procedure please contact the Head of Museums via our contact form. Please note we require a minimum of six months' notice for loan requests. We are planning to establish a handling collection, but at present cannot loan caps and other uniform items for service funerals.