UK Parliament announces free, public exhibition to celebrate women's suffrage

Located in Westminster Hall, the exhibition will use immersive and interactive technologies to tell the story of women and parliament.

Lost historic spaces which were used to segregate women from the business of Parliament will be recreated and the story of those crucial campaigners and trailblazers retold.

The exhibition will include key historic objects from Parliamentary collections. In addition, it will feature a series of significant items on loan from around the UK, brought together for the first time ever.

A story to inspire

One of the star loans reveals the story of Alice Hawkins, a WSPU suffragette from Leicester who was jailed five times for campaigning for women's rights. 

The loan from Alice's family to the Voice and Vote exhibition includes her original Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU) sash, a ‘Holloway' portcullis brooch and her hunger strike medal, awarded by the WSPU for “a gallant action”. 

It is the first time these items have been put on public display. Buried in a pauper's grave, Alice's heroic actions are now being recognised as a statue of her is unveiled in her home town of Leicester.

How to get involved

Free tickets for the exhibition will be available online from Tuesday 6 February.

The exhibition will be open from 27 June until 06 October, and is part of UK Parliament's Vote 100 campaign, a year-long programme of events and activities celebrating a century of women's voices in Parliament, the journey towards universal suffrage and the first women MPs.

Throughout 2018, Vote 100 will celebrate these milestones, and the contribution of women to politics in the UK, with a series of events, exhibitions and educational programmes. For further information on Vote 100 click here.

To find out how to get tickets and plan your visit you can go to the Voice and Vote home page on UK Parliament's website here.

To find out more about Voice and Vote, you can visit our online exhibition here.