Former female Pyrex staff sought for exhibition
Historic EnglandWomen who worked at a Pyrex factory are being sought for an exhibition.
Sophie Piper is seeking women who worked at the former factory in Sunderland as part of a planned exhibition in the city later this year.
The exhibition will showcase the photographs of photographer Eileen Deste, who took hundreds of images of workers at the site in 1961.
Piper said she hoped by pairing the photographs of the women with some of their stories, it could highlight a history which had often been overlooked.
"A lot of stories of women's work in Sunderland haven't been told," she said.
Deste had an interest in photographing industrial workers and travelled around the country to do so, often for free, Piper said.
She said she came across Deste's work after discovering the local museum had few photographic prints of female Pyrex workers, despite the women's presence in many of the firm's in-house magazines from the time.
Historic EnglandPiper said women held all types of jobs at Pyrex at the time, such as lab-workers who tested the glass.
She said around the time Deste took these photos, the factory employed about 3,500 workers but she could not find out how many were women.
The factory shut down in 2007.
Working with Historic England and the North East Photography Network, the researcher is seeking women who worked at the factory to help her provide some context to Deste's photographs.
Piper advised anyone who was interested in taking part to contact the organisation.
She hopes to start interviewing former workers in April.
Historic EnglandAn exhibition based on the resulting interviews and Deste's photographs will be held in the city in the autumn, she said.
Piper, who is doing a PhD at Sunderland Museum & Winter Gardens, said she believed the exhibition would be important because the role women play in the workforce, both past and present, was often unacknowledged.
"It's about being able to show an accurate labour history to empower future generations," she said.
