Director Receives Award

Lindsey Lambert, the Pottery Center’s executive director since June 2013, received the 2023 North Carolina Museums Council’s Professional Service Award this past Sunday, April 7th, during the Council’s 2024 annual meeting. The nonprofit Museums Council’s mission is Building Better Museums Together. Only one individual per year is selected to receive this award. The person selected must be employed at a North Carolina museum and have distinguished themselves in the museum field and/or have professionally advanced the role of museums or that of the North Carolina Museums Council.

Says Lindsey, “It is indeed an honor to be recognized by my Museums Council colleagues and friends. The North Carolina Museums Council means a lot to me, and the Council’s mission of Building Better Museums Together helps to ensure that we, as museum professionals, are creating safe and informative educational spaces that allow and encourage our state’s residents and visitors to our state to think critically about our state’s past, present, and future. Together, we, all of us, can work to build the best possible future by learning from our past and present.”

Lindsey has a Master of Arts degree in Public History from Appalachian State University. During his tenure, the center has received 80+ grants totaling more than 1.6 million dollars. Most recently, and not included in the previous figure, the center has received a matching challenge grant opportunity worth up to $400,000 a year for five years, with all funds raised and matched going into an endowment for the center on an annual basis. By mid-March of this year, the center had already met its Year One goal of $400,000, meaning the center will now have an endowment of $800,000 as soon as the Year 1 paperwork is submitted.

Before joining the North Carolina Pottery Center, Lindsey was the director of Greensboro College’s College Museum & Archives for almost thirteen years.

Lindsey has served on the board of the North Carolina Museums Council since around 2005 in a variety of capacities: nominating chair, treasurer, vice president, president, and immediate past president. During his time as treasurer, he spent six months working with a pro bono accountant to bring the council back into good standing with the IRS and NC DOR, even securing several prior years’ worth of sales tax reimbursements from the state. While vice president, Lindsey stepped up to become president a year early when the then-president stepped away from the board for personal reasons. He then served a full term as president during which the board created an endowment for the Council. He currently serves on the board in an ex-officio capacity as the Council’s techmeister but will soon be transitioning to chair of the Council’s new Past President’s Circle committee. He has also represented the council at Arts Day for multiple years.