A Man Who Said He'd Build A Museum About Women Made It About Jack The Ripper Instead

    The museum, which originally promised to celebrate women's rights and accomplishments, is now about a notorious serial killer who targeted women.

    A man who promised to build the UK’s first women’s museum has instead created a museum to serial killer Jack the Ripper.

    Mark Palmer-Edgecumbe, a diversity adviser, had his proposal for a women's museum to be built on Cable Street in Whitechapel approved by Tower Hamlets council last October.

    Palmer-Edgecumbe, a former head of diversity and inclusion for Google, worked with architects at Waugh Thistleton to create the proposal.

    A spokesperson at Waugh Thistleton confirmed to BuzzFeed News that they worked with Palmer-Edgecumbe, but said they did not work with him to change the museum's theme.

    Palmer-Edgecumbe said the victims of Jack the Ripper would be a more "interesting" angle than the social history of women. He told Evening Standard:

    We did plan to do a museum about social history of women but as the project developed we decided a more interesting angle was from the perspective of the victims of Jack the Ripper.

    It is absolutely not celebrating the crime of Jack the Ripper but looking at why and how the women got in that situation in the first place.

    The original proposal for the woman's museum, available on the Tower Hamlet council's website, included images of suffragettes and equal pay campaigners.

    Palmer-Edgecumbe described his goal as “celebrating the achievements of the women of the East End” of London in the proposal.

    The museum also promised to share the stories of women workers in factories and sweatshops.

    But local residents realised that decision had been reversed after they noticed a sign on the building saying it was a “Jack the Ripper” museum.

    #JackTheRipperMuseum is #OpeningSoon #Follow for more details! #EastLondon

    On its website, Palmer-Edgecumbe stressed that the new museum would not glorify the mass murderer.

    "The Jack the Ripper Museum in no way glorifies or glamorises Jack the Ripper," the statement read. "Quite the opposite, it presents the women of the East End's story for the first time."

    But local residents disagreed and have expressed outrage at the decision.

    Jack the Ripper Museum Cable Street Whitechapel. Where women have been reduced to a red smudge

    That Cable Street Jack the Ripper museum looks like being a regular carnival of decency & good taste @richmondbridge

    Jeanne Sutton, a co-founder of Ireland's first digital women's museum, said she was disappointed in the focus on female victims rather than their achievements.

    Sutton said that although Jack the Ripper story is an essential chapter in London's crime and sex worker history, "there's a lot more to women's history than dead bodies".

    She told BuzzFeed News: "It's rather disappointing that Mr Palmer-Edgecumbe chose to focus on the most salacious aspect of East End history, using female victims in a bid to attract visitors."

    BuzzFeed News has contacted Palmer-Edgecumbe for further comment.