The Heath Robinson Museum opened in October 2016 to house a collection of nearly 1,000 original artworks owned by The William Heath Robinson Trust. He may have not have made a fortune or led a life of adventure, but from the suburbs he managed to make the fantastical creations that people have enjoyed for more than a hundred years. How to hunt tigers by elephant, how to get an even tan, rise with the sun or put out a chimney fire, these and many more pressing questions are answered in the pages of Contraptions. At the time of Heath Robinson's death in 1944, only a minority of the public remembered his work as a serious illustrator.

One of the automatic analysis machines built for Bletchley Park during the Second World War to assist in the decryption of German message traffic was named " Heath Robinson" in his honour. It is the essential source of information and ideas that make sense of a world in constant transformation. The Wallace-Gromit household borrows heavily from a full-scale model of a contraption-filled house entitled "The Gadget Family", designed and built for the Ideal Home Show in 1934 -- there are even trapdoors delivering the family to the breakfast table. With illustrations salvaged from the family archives and commentary by Heath Robinson expert, Geoffrey Beare, Contraptions is the best possible introduction to the work of one of Britain's great comic talents.In 1918 the Heath Robinsons moved to Cranleigh, Surrey where their daughter attended St Catherine's School, Bramley and their son attended Cranleigh School.

The museum’s permanent collection tells the story of Robinson’s life and career, describing a hard-working illustrator who lived a reasonably modest and happy life mostly on the outskirts of London. The eponymous hero is tasked with looking after his nephew Peter, who is one day whisked away by a large bird.Heath Robinson's name has been used to describe absurdly complex, makeshift contraptions since the early 20th century.