Respect, integrity, empowerment and inclusion. These are the four core values The Vagina Museum seeks to uphold and, being the only one of its kind, The Vagina Museum is buzzing with people wanting to know more, these values creating an environment that allows all to feel comfortable learning about what outside those walls is taboo.

In its current exhibition, The Vagina Museum is combatting one of the biggest of these taboos – the period. In a single panel, I was taught more about periods than my entire school sex education did, and all it was basic biology – the basic cycle. But through knowledge, The Vagina Museum is changing the future by retracing history. 

The Vagina Museum is combatting one of the biggest of these taboos – the period

As the name of the exhibition suggests – Periods: A Brief History – the museum is packed with historical accounts and beliefs about the menstrual cycle. From the first visual depictions and the Greek’s associations between women and the moon’s cycles to the evolution of period products over time, the room is exploding with information. 

One period product the museum foregrounds is the first adjustable strap for sanitary pads and, while it may seem uncomfortable and restricting to us, it made changing pads on-the-go much easier. Pioneered by Mary Beatrice Davidson Kenner, it was also the first with an adhesive backing. However, while her invention was revolutionary for menstruating women, she never received credit, and was constantly rejected by companies for being a Black woman. The Vagina Museum is changing the myth companies morphed her into; she is shown by the museum as having been a woman of invention, a woman innovation, and a woman of history.

Myths have perpetuated for centuries, different in every corner of the globe: from the French believing that making mayonnaise while menstruating will make it curdle or Mexicans advising women on their periods not to dance vigorously as to not damage their uteruses. The Vagina Museum, though, busts period myths with facts. This is the main aim of their previous exhibition Muff Busters, now available online. Whether it is common or as obscure as the 1950’s myth of douching Coca Cola as a form of contraception, this exhibition debunks it. Their advice? ‘Don’t put Coke in your vagina.’ 

While many of these myths may seem things of the past, this exhibition highlights the many that are prevalent in society today. In 2012, for example, a textbook was published in India that describes the genital differences between a “true” and “false” virgin. Muff Busters exhibition reminds all that virginity is a social construct and all vulvas different.

The Vagina Museum doesn’t stop at its exhibitions, but extends to their monthly book club Cliterature and other online events. They have resources for classrooms like an intersex matching game and anatomy worksheets.

Through respect, integrity, empowerment and inclusion it educates, it advocates

With YouGov reporting that more than 50% of people cannot correctly label and describe the function of the vagina, urethra, and labia, these tools are, too, educational for those of us beyond the sex-ed classroom. The learning, though, doesn’t have to stop there – when the Victorian vibrator and the history of pubic hair are just some of the topics waiting to be listened to on their podcast. 

With a period product collection box at their front desk and a section of the museum dedicated to charities, individuals, and organisations working to provide refugees with free period products as well as break down the stigma of vagina and period discussions, The Vagina Museum really is a force for good. Through respect, integrity, empowerment and inclusion it educates, it advocates.

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