Marsh Charitable Trust – Marsh Award for Emerging Talent in Conservation

Marsh Award for Emerging Talent in Conservation

This Award recognises emerging conservation professionals and their early career contribution to the practice of conservation.

The Award is open to conservators and heritage scientists who have completed their academic qualification within the last 5 years or those with less than 5 years of workplace experience if they are following vocational training routes.

< back

Dominic Oakes 2025

Dominic Oakes, Graduate Conservator, Brighton and Hive Museums

Since graduating in 2022 with a degree in Conservation of Cultural Heritage from the University of Lincoln, Dominic began his career at Brighton and Hove Museums in January 2024 as a Conservation Assistant, later becoming a Graduate Conservator. He has contributed across multiple sites with varied collections, demonstrating strong collaboration and public engagement. At the Royal Pavilion, he carries out preventive conservation, often in public view, sparking interest and discussion around his work. Dominic has taken on diverse tasks including condition monitoring, exhibition installation, event supervision, and filming projects. He actively promotes conservation awareness among colleagues. His first leadership project involved the Costume Store at Brighton Museum and Art Gallery, where he tackled widespread mould caused by a historic leak and Covid-related neglect. Over 650 objects have been cleaned so far, with careful planning and problem solving required due to limited space and varied object types. He also trained two University of Brighton students, who praised the experience for deepening their interest in conservation. At Preston Manor, Dominic helped clean and prepare the site for reopening after years of closure. At the Booth Museum, he led a volunteer project inspecting specimens for pest damage, providing thorough training and fostering high participation. His work continues to support conservation and public engagement.

Previous Winners

Alannah Hay, National Museum of the Royal Navy (Portsmouth)

Alannah originally joined the team in March 2023 as Conservation Technician, before stepping in to the role of Conservator in September 2023 where she has been a vital member of the team ever since. Her role covers the conservation of all of the Museum’s collections, from small to large items including ships and submarines. She carries out treatment and preventative tasks on the collection and liaises closely with multiple teams to provide crucial conservation advice and support. Alannah juggles a varied collection and is always accurate in the conservation techniques that each piece she works on needs, creating new processes and methods where necessary to make her work as efficient as possible. Alannah is also a great advocate for conservation, both within the museum and externally. She engages well with visitors to explain conservation methods with them and has even spoken to Princess Anne about the challenges of conservation and how the museum is navigating them. She has also featured in media interviews, stepping out of her comfort zone to spread the work about conservation as widely as she can. Alannah is a great mentor to volunteers and other staff members, taking the time and effort to provide them with the best possible training which then comes across in the quality of the work they produce. She is incredibly dedicated and hardworking, and has made a positive impact on the team in a short space of time.

Marina Herriges

Marina spearheaded a project with the University of Glasgow which identified the value of promoting sustainability in textile conservation at the beginning point of a conservator’s career, since they will be the one leading in this area of conservation in the future. The project ran between September 2020 and August 2022 and Marina, as an emerging conservator herself, had a pivotal role in designing and implementing the project. Her work has changes approached to sustainable practices in the curriculum of the MPhil Textile Conservation Programme at Glasgow (and beyond) and has created more opportunities for dialogue between staff, students and emerging professionals about sustainability in this field.

Marina brought knowledge and understanding of sustainable practices, as well as her experiences of the Programme as a recent graduate, and demonstrated the important contributions that can be made by emerging conservators, both as role models for leadership and advocates for sustainability. The project has become a model for other conservation departments at the University of Glasgow and has helped to contribute to wider debates about sustainability in the conservation sector as a whole. Marina’s drive and passion for sustainability is infectious, and she has fostered changes in teaching practices and inspired future generations of conservators.