Royal Cornwall Museum to close for renovation work

The Royal Cornwall Museum is to shut for two months in January 2025 for major transformation work, bosses have said.

The museum in Truro said its regular winter closure would be extended by one month to allow gallery spaces and the balcony to be modernised.

It said items from the museum would be "on the road" during the closure, with a team to deliver workshops across the county with museum artefacts.

Bosses said the current phase of the project received £2.3m in funding from the government's Shared Prosperity Fund, which is managed locally by the Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Good Growth Programme.

Artistic director Bryony Robins said the museum would close in January and February for an "exciting refresh ready to reopen in early spring 2025".

"This planned winter closure will allow the major work to forge ahead safely and efficiently," she said.

The nature gallery will be redesigned in consultation with Cornwall Wildlife Trust, the museum said.

It said the balcony of the main atrium would become an art gallery and the central space in the museum would become a new Heart of Cornwall Gallery.

Ms Robins said the museum's learning team would be aboard the education library service bus to deliver ancient Egypt and Victorian toy workshops in eight libraries across Cornwall during the winter closure.

Executive director Jonathan Morton said: "We're taking the opportunity to get out into the community as much as possible and engage diverse and geographically remote audiences with what the museum has to offer."

The transformation project began with the Mineral Gallery, which reopened in July.

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