Dorset Museum reopens after £16m transformation

Dorset Museum has reopened its doors after a £16.4m transformation.

The 140-year-old building in Dorchester has been upgraded and extended, with a new wing and large subterranean stores for its collections.

The revitalised attraction includes four new galleries, an exhibition space, restaurant, shop and library.

The climate-controlled spaces have already allowed the museum to secure important new collections, including sculptures and art by Elisabeth Frink.

Other exhibits include Jurassic Coast fossils and the Thomas Hardy archive, which includes the author's handwritten manuscript for The Woodlanders.

The Elisabeth Frink works, donated by the artist's family, were created at her former home in Woolland, Dorset.

Museum executive director Jon Murden said without the new extension the collection "would have left the county because the old museum didn't have the facilities".

"One of the things I'm most proud of is the way the ambition of the museum has brought in collections that we wouldn't have had before," he said.

The atrium at the heart of the new wing features the Fordington mosaic, previously displayed on the floor of the old 1960s extension, which was demolished to make way for the new building.

The mosaic was carefully removed and conserved by Cliveden Conservation, before being installed at its new location in 2020.

Mr Murden said the project had started out as a collections storage facility for its millions of artefacts stored in properties around the county town.

But the limitations of the 1960s extension meant ambitions quickly "snowballed".

In the original Victorian building, the old library has been turned into a 50-seat restaurant, while the old cafe is a classroom and the former Jurassic Coast room is now the new members' library.

The museum, which has been closed since October 2018, had been due to reopen last year but work was delayed by the Covid pandemic.

Mr Murden said: "It's been eight years since we put the first line on a piece of paper about what we could do.

"It was going to be a challenge anyway but the last year has made it even more challenging, for so many people.

"The timing has come quite well in the end, with the restrictions being lifted."

Dorset County Museum, as it was previously called, was founded in 1846 and the neo-gothic museum in High West Street was built in 1881.

During the revamp, a tower crane was installed to lift materials and artefacts in to the confined town centre site, which is flanked by terraced houses and a church.

The revamp was part-funded by a £11.3m National Heritage Lottery Fund grant.

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