Museum of London Merriman began his career at the
Museum of London in 1986 as
Curator of
Prehistory and subsequently in 1991, Merriman became the head of Department of Early London History and Collections. During this time he led a project called ‘The Peopling of London’, which told the story of the capital's cultural diversity from ancient times to the present through a ground-breaking exhibition and related activities in 1993. Merriman also authored and edited an accompanying book of the same title, published in 1993.
University College London In 1997 Merriman joined the Institute of Archaeology at
University College London as senior lecturer, where he ran the
Museum Studies Masters course and developed new courses in cultural heritage studies and in public
archaeology. He was later promoted to reader. While at UCL he became very interested in the university's extensive, but rather hidden, museums and collections, which include the
Petrie Museum and
the Grant Museum. He led the creation of a new university-wide museum service and became director of museums and collections alongside his academic duties. This later became UCL Culture.
Clore Leadership Programme In 2004, Merriman joined the inaugural
Clore Leadership Programme undertaking a bespoke scheme of training and development in cultural leadership. His research project looked at issues of memory and forgetting in memory institutions such as museums, in the context of thinking about sustainability and the disposal of objects from collections. Published in the journal Cultural Trends, this work was influential in driving the debate about these issues in the museum sector.
Manchester Museum Merriman was appointed director of
Manchester Museum in the
University of Manchester in 2006. Merriman focused the museum's mission on promoting understanding between cultures and working towards a sustainable world and also oversaw the refurbishment of most of the museum's permanent galleries. This, together with a major programme of public engagement, led to a doubling of the museum's visitor numbers to over 500,000 a year. Over a decade, audiences also diversified to approximately reflect the demographics of the Greater Manchester population. The museum gained a reputation for innovative work. This included the installation of a '
hermit' in the museum's tower in 2009 where a
performance artist, Ansuman Biswas, lived for 40 days and 40 nights, contemplating the future of the planet and inviting people to think about why museums hold on to huge amounts of material, and the use of events company villa eugénie — who normally work on fashion launches — to work on the radical redisplay of the museum's natural history galleries. Merriman also led a £13m capital project to transform the capacity of the museum and open it up to wider publics, including a new exhibition hall, a South Asia Gallery in partnership with the
British Museum and a Chinese Culture Gallery. In 2018 Merriman was succeeded by
Esme Ward, the first female Director in the Museum's history, who saw the project through to opening in 2021. In 2017 Merriman was made Honorary Professor of Museum Studies at the University of Manchester.
Horniman Museum and Gardens In May 2018 Merriman was appointed Chief Executive of the
Horniman Museum and Gardens in London, succeeding
Dame Janet Vitmayer. Merriman was appointed
Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the
2024 New Year Honours for services to the arts and heritage.
English Heritage Merriman took up the role of chief executive of English Heritage in February 2024. He initiated a programme of cost-cutting, in the face of financial challenges and post-pandemic changes to visitor behaviour; this involved job cuts, downgrading of professional curatorial roles, and site closures in winter. On 24 June 2025 it was announced that he had stood down from the role, for personal family reasons.
Other roles Merriman was chair of the
International Council of Museums (UK) from 2001 to 2004, president of the
Council for British Archaeology from 2005 to 2008 and chair of the University Museums Group from 2009 to 2013. Merriman was convenor of the
Museums Association's ethics committee from 2008 to 2014 and chair of the
Collections Trust from 2013 to 2016. From 2017 to 2019 he was chair of the
Wellcome Trust’s Inspiring Science Fund committee. Merriman is chair of the environment and ecology subgroup of the National Museum Directors’ Council. == Personal life ==