The Museum of the History of Packaging

Packaging samples, labels, advertising paraphernalia, and archival documents on the packaging industry began to be collected simultaneously with the magazine’s founding in the early 1990s. The museum was officially opened in 1999 as a special department of the Polytechnic Museum (a museum in a museum).

The collections are constantly being replenished. Until 2010, the museum was supported by the Board of Trustees, which included the largest manufacturers and suppliers of packaging products and labels, including the Sokolniki Exhibition and Convention Center.

At the end of 2010, the Museum of the History of Packaging was closed due to the Polytechnic Museum’s closure for “reconstruction”.

Since 1994, the editorial staff of the magazine has been constantly organizing and conducting retrospective exhibitions based on the museum’s exhibits and archives. In particular, expositions were organized as part of industrial exhibitions in Leipzig, Düsseldorf, Milan, and Florence, as well as in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Vladimir, Pereslavl-Zalessky, etc. In 2017, the Technologies and Packaging Design Scientific, Educational and Exhibition Center at the RGU named after A.N. Kosygin was created. At the same time, SEEC created and operates a branch of The Museum of the History of Packaging. The work of the museum is informationally supported by the Tare and Packaging magazine and its resources and information partners. In 2019, the museum celebrated its 20th anniversary! And in 2020, it was the 30th anniversary of the Tare and Packaging magazine. Since it was published from 1930 to 1932, it is 90 years old and our social project, the Clockwork Orange International Student Competition is 25 years old.

The collections consist of 3 main sections:

– samples of Russian packaging, labels, and advertising paraphernalia from ancient times to 1917;

– samples of packaging, labels, and advertising attributes from the USSR from the 1920s–80s;

– samples of modern Russian packaging, labels, and advertising attributes (this section is constantly being updated due to the holding of national and international competitions by the magazine since 1995, as well as the participation of the magazine in industrial exhibitions in the Russian Federation and abroad). There is an exposition devoted to technologies for separate collection, sorting, processing, and recycling; a library of historical and specialized literature is being completed in this section. The editors are looking for a room and a partner for the permanent placement of The Museum of the History of Packaging.