Ben Heasman

Ben Heasman is a Client Partner at Torchbox, working with public sector and cultural organisations to shape digital products that support real user needs. He has led work with museums, galleries and cultural institutions including London Museum, Tate and the Paul Mellon Centre, helping them improve how people discover, access and engage with collections and research resources online.

Ben Heasman is speaking at the Digital Collections Summit 2026 :

Designing better access to hidden collections

Most of a museum or archive collection will never be fully online. So how do you use digital to help researchers decide whether a physical visit is worth making, and then make that visit as smooth as possible?

This talk explores how the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art is redesigning its digital front door: moving a largely manual, email-driven archive access process onto its new website, using linked data to surface just enough collection context, and building a hybrid registration journey that works for researchers and staff alike.

A practical case study in designing digital as preparation for the physical, not a replacement for it.