Royal Armouries
Preserving, sharing and commercialising one of the world's most important collections.
Over 160,000 digital assets centralised in a DAMS built to support the UK's national museum of arms and armour, improving access, enabling commercial licensing and laying the groundwork for future innovation.
The background.
Royal Armouries is the UK's national museum of arms and armour, caring for one of the world's most significant collections of weapons, armour and military artefacts. It supports researchers, publishers, educators and visitors through a growing collection of high-quality digital assets and image licensing services.
Aetopia partnered with Royal Armouries to provide a Digital Asset Management platform that improves access to collections, supports commercial services and creates a foundation for future innovation.
The challenge.
A DAMS to improve access, enable commercial services and future-proof a nationally significant collection.
Centralised access
Create a single trusted source for digital assets across the museum, replacing fragmented storage with a unified platform.
Support commercial licensing
Improve the management and distribution of images for external customers, researchers and publishers.
Improve discoverability
Enhance metadata quality and make assets easier to find for staff, researchers and commercial customers alike.
Future-proof the platform
Support future initiatives including 3D content management, digital commerce and the Creative Content Exchange platform.
A connected digital asset platform.
Working closely with the Royal Armouries team, Aetopia configured and implemented a DAMS built around the museum's specific requirements, integrating existing collection data and creating the foundations for commercial and creative services.
- DAMS configured around the museum's workflows and collection requirements.
- Integration with Axiell EMu collections data via CIIM Middleware.
- Automated migration of approximately 100,000 digital assets.
- Metadata cleansing and enrichment to improve search and discoverability.
- Secure internal access for museum staff alongside controlled external sharing capabilities.
- Foundations for commercial licensing and image distribution, including the Creative Content Exchange platform.
The work, step by step.
From first discovery through to a live platform, keeping each workstream to one clear goal.
Discovery workshops
Worked collaboratively with Royal Armouries to understand current challenges, collection requirements and long-term objectives for the platform.
Configuration & integration
Configured the DAMS around the museum's requirements and integrated collections data from Axiell EMu via CIIM Middleware connectors.
Migration & metadata improvement
Migrated approximately 100,000 assets from legacy systems, with metadata cleansing and enrichment throughout to improve discoverability.
Supporting future growth
Delivered a platform capable of supporting commercial licensing, 3D assets and future content-sharing initiatives as the museum's digital ambitions grow.
"Aetopia make a DAMS so intuitive that you barely need training to use it. We partnered with them to centralise not only our collections assets but our entire IP Pipeline across every department and over 100 staff from content creation, to management, to publication. Their friendly hands-on team is responsive and entirely client focused and puts our business needs first. Their technology serves the needs of users and doesn't get in the way. No hidden fees and always staying ahead of the best in class DAMS thinking. Bravo!"
The results.
Where this goes next.
The relationship continues to grow as Royal Armouries explores new possibilities around image licensing, creative content sharing and 3D collections. Aetopia remains a trusted digital partner, helping the organisation increase access to its collection while creating new opportunities for engagement and revenue generation.
Aetopia DAMS
Built for collections at any scale.
Aetopia's Digital Asset Management System helps heritage organisations, archives and institutions preserve, organise and provide access to their most important collections, with powerful metadata management, system integration and the scalability to grow with your digitisation programme.