Few people would want to earn their crust in a Victorian workhouse, but Martin Humphries is often here, in one of Charlie Chaplin’s childhood homes, six days a week. The friendly figure at the entrance to the Master’s House, casual with tied-back grey tresses and slouchy cardigan, is at odds with the desolate brick-built institution, flanked by half-demolished buildings in a back-street of Kennington.

For the last nine years, the former Lambeth Workhouse has housed the Cinema Museum, co-founded by Humphries and friend Ronald Grant in 1986. What lies within is a magical record of the whole cinema-going experience, ranging from reels of film to usherettes’ torches. Humphries is a director of the museum and operations manager for the associated Ronald Grant Picture Archive, which funds it. But this wasn’t what he planned to do.

"I used to go to the cinema a lot when I was a child and certainly when I was at university, but I was more interested in the theatre," admits Humphries. That changed in 1979, after meeting Ronald Grant at Oval House arts centre. Grant had started a picture library, featuring all aspects of cinema and had also amassed a large number of films, posters and projectors, all of which needed organising.

"Once Ronald realised I had strong administration skills, he was very keen that I come and work for him, which I did in 1983," says Humphries. "He’s very entrepreneurial, but when pictures came back, he wouldn’t put them back in the filing cabinets. I came in and sorted all that out, set up systems and made the operation run more efficiently."

He wistfully remembers starting out in crumbling Raleigh Hall in Brixton. "Those were the halcyon days. You could put the answer phone on in the afternoon and go and see a film at The Ritzy. You can’t do that these days; you have to be available.

"We were able to improve the storage conditions of the collection and then we had this incredible bonanza when we ended up with all this stuff from Aberdeen."

He’s referring to the moment their hoard reached critical mass in 1986. Grant and Humphries bought two huge truck-loads of objects which had been stored in a church in Aberdeen following local cinema closures. "We just happened to be there at the right time and it was like walking into an Aladdin’s cave," Humphries recalls. They acquired doors, light-fittings, seats, carpet samples and ushers’ uniforms, mostly dating from the 40s and 50s. "It was then that we realised this was a significant collection that needed a long-term future, where it would be accessible and could be displayed. That’s where the idea of a museum came from."

"Up until that point we were just thinking about saving things that were lovely and we didn’t want them to get destroyed. We had already collected things from cinemas that were being demolished," explains Humphries. "Generally, people were fine if you gave them 20 quid, because we were saving them a job if we came in and took decorative items. They didn’t see any value in them and thought we were slightly crazy."

Twenty-two years later, the corridors of the Lambeth Workhouse are packed with every conceivable cinema-related item: film cans stacked high, foyer signs, projectors and promotional ephemera. A beautiful Art Deco panel of etched glass was salvaged from the Gaumont Palace in Lewisham (c 1930), while there are examples of the original 1911 plasterwork from The Ritzy in Brixton.

Greta Garbo and Dirk Bogarde stare from their posters on the stairway, which leads to rooms stuffed with film-related books, complete runs of Spotlight and Photoplay and over 150 filing cabinets of photographs. It’s overwhelming, but Humphries appears to know where everything is; challenged with finding an archive picture of The Capitol in Forest Hill, he emerges triumphantly from a cabinet within seconds, brandishing a black and white print of the exterior dating from 1946.

Dealing with photo requests is one of Humphries’ main tasks, along with scanning material for the online library and helping researchers navigate the archives, but recently his job has included looking for new premises. This follows the crushing news that they

must vacate the building by the end of May and may be forced to leave the borough. The museum was recently given a two-month reprieve by their landlord, the South London and Maudsley NHS Trust, which is selling up. Currently Humphries doesn’t know where the treasures will go next.

"Obviously at the moment, there’s a lot of talking to people about the future," says Humphries, "It’s a bit stressful". Open afternoons on a Sunday have raised the museum’s profile: "The amount of interest that’s been shown recently has been a real boost," he says, "But we haven’t yet met anyone who can do anything for us. Our ideal would be a permanent space where we could create a very atmospheric exhibition from the material we’ve got; it would be evocative of what a cinema is like. Then, we’d like a temporary exhibition space that could key into something that’s going on elsewhere, like a Charlton Heston season at the BFI Southbank. It really is just finding a space that works."

While the future of this unique and very special enterprise remains uncertain, it is clearly a labour of love for Humphries, Grant and the other five members of staff. "This is nothing like an average job," he says, "It’s for life."